Date: 31 January, 2007
Venue: Sydney Comedy Store, Moore Park
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For the uninitiated, the Sydney Comedy Store is situated in a dingy corner of the Entertainment Complex at Moore Park, sandwiched between some car parks at the back of some cinemas. Yet, it is a venue that consistently provides quality comedic talent most nights of the week in a warm, laidback environment and the night of January 31st, 2007 was no exception.
Skithouse’s Michael Chamberlain was recruited as the MC for the proceedings and the set began with performances by three new comics. The first of the three was Desh, who had a sarcastic wit and milked jokes about Indian stereotypes and society’s fear regarding security, to the utmost. That said, he did provide an interesting line about Jesus, noting that given the current security alert in airports this would most probably mean that even the Son of God would be hassled thanks to his ethnicity and beard.
The second comedian was Nick Sun and put simply, he was an angry and cynical, young man. Whilst he was amusing to listen to, he was not overly hilarious as he pointed out his unique way of relating to people at parties. That is to engage them in a discussion about his overwhelming desire to spike the water supply.
Finally, the third new comic proudly proclaimed that his former job was as a “Latte Transporter” in Sydney’s Oxford Street. He used to provide service for customers who wanted decaf, latte, Grandes with lite milk to go (that means now, junior!) The funniest of the three, he was also good at imitating a pilot running to ensure he gets the correct seat on a Jetstar flight (after all, there is no seat allocation.) He also concluded the first half with some oft-used observations about language barriers (think thongs vs. flip flops.)
After the short interval, MC Michael Chamberlain returned to add two new revelations to the proceedings. The first was that because his sister is pregnant, he proudly realised that he has the opportunity to become the “dodgy uncle.” Secondly, he noted that comedians only fair a little better than magicians in the Entertainment Industry pecking order.
Finally, headliner Charlie Pickering began his set with material taken from his Betterman and Auto shows. He impersonated his school principal who amazingly resembled a crow. He also recounted with extreme joy some memories of his 1930s-themed birthday party.
Suddenly the show underwent a slight twist as Pickering performed readings from B. B. King’s autobiography. The tome sounds like a real corker given the man uses the following as his opening sentence, “I struggle with words.”
It appears that the English language was the topic of choice for the final part of the set as he made observations about some of the moronic and choice phrases George Bush has used. Comedians have covered the words, termed “Bushisms” due to his attack on the English language ad nauseam, but Pickering mentioned my new favourite, “misunderestimate.”
In sum, the show was most enjoyable with a nice selection of comedians, each with different senses of humour and individual approaches to their comedy. It was definitely a nice sample of each man’s talent, what you could call a comedy buffet of sorts.
