Presented by Paco Erhard

Comedy Shack

Review by Anika Landy

Before Paco Erhard even took to the stage, the Comedy Shack already had an upbeat atmosphere to it. As the buzzing crowd hushes, the German comedian emerges onto the stage, beer in tow, and is greeted by a huge cheer from the equally German and Australian audience to begin his show A (very brief) history of German humour. In an exaggerated, captivating German accent, Erhard promises a night observing Australians in their “natural habitat” — always a promising activity.

Covering an extensive array of topics — from German and Australian politics, national identity and the difference between Australians, Americans and Brits — the show is clearly instilled with Erhard’s own upbeat comedic flavor. It’s heavily commentary-based, with Erhard giving his own quirky observations of different stereotypes around the world, either disproving or validating them in a hilarious and factual manner.

The diversity of the audience meant that many jokes fell flat on some of the crowd. Most of his jokes related to either Germans or Australians, with very little middle ground connecting the two. The crowd was sometimes left logically dissecting Erhard’s one-liners, understanding that intellectually they had the possibility for a laugh but still lacked that particular punch.

And though there weren’t too many flat points, the most memorable segments of the night were the ad-libbed ones. With the distraction of a constant thumping from a gym upstairs, Erhard left the audience in stitches from his reactions and impersonations prompted by the disruption. Outlining the differences between a German audience and an Australian one, Erhard continued to engage warmly with the audience throughout the night, even when an interchange threatens to go awry.

Erhard loves Australia, Germany, Britain, America and just about every other country he has traveled to throughout his life, singling each of them out for their own unusual habits and unique humour. His exploration of the Australian population through his eyes elevated the baseline joy that Erhard automatically brings to his upbeat and welcoming show.

Through his hilarious impersonation of a Queensland ‘bogan’ and his ongoing juxtaposition of Australians and Germans, Erhard prompted laugh after laugh from an equally energetic audience. Praising “80%” of Australians for their open-mindedness, he repeatedly highlighted what is great about our country — its diversity.

A (very brief) history of German humour runs until the 21^th of February at the Comedy Shack, Northbridge. Tickets are available here.

Presented by Summer Nights, lucidity suitcase intercontinental & PICA

PICA Performance Space 

Review by Anika Landy

The PICA performance space darkens and fills with smoke; a sole spotlight illuminates a middle-aged man standing in front of a desk with a lamp allowing us to just make out a world map in front of him. Abruptly he begins a booming monologue, his voice whipping through the theatre. “Let him depart; his passport shall be made,” he bellows. The sole actor is reciting a Shakespearean speech from Henry V.

Theatre director, designer, actor and performing extraordinaire Thaddeus Phillips engagingly recreates 17 remarkable global border crossings in this visual, sensory, intellectual and witty theatrical show. After his urgent spiel on the invention of the passport dating back to the 1600s, Phillips engages the audience in a figurative hypnosis to begin our journey around the world with our own ‘American passport’.

With the use of minimal props, lighting and sounds, Phillips manages to single-handedly take each and every audience member around the world in his high energy and personable minute-by-minute recounts. Featuring a cast of lurid characters, all played by Phillips, the show explores wildly different experiences of various international borders of the world. Each border brilliantly encompasses a small skit using a single table and chair to create the holding cell, airport terminal, Mediterranean beach or Austrian chairlift you found yourself in or on.

Tremendous as it was, the show felt too long. After almost an hour and a half of border crossings and hearing Phillips impressively ramble off more than ten different languages, the scenes felt repetitive. As though the story arc peaked too quickly, the audience became less engaged at the 40 minute mark, shifting in their seats. Jumping from place to place with non-chronological years thrown in between, created a chaotic urgency to this show, such that it felt too slow and too fast at different points in the night.

From Hungary to Serbia, Amsterdam to France, Singapore to Bali, Colombia to Morocco, Phillips not only took the audience on a journey around the world; he plunged you into an experience like no other. His comedy style personas received a great audience reaction throughout the night until the show dribbled on for longer than what felt comfortable. All in all an extraordinary display of talent and energy-fueled acting made the show a standout in its own way, if over-extended in its session time.

17 Border Crossings runs until the 6^th of February at the PICA Performance Space, Northbridge. Tickets are available here.

Sold out three years in a row, 600 seconds allows groups or single performers to present their talent with only one binding condition: anything goes, but only for 600 seconds. The performers’ energy and talent is astounding and must be commended. Their charm, wit and humor keep things lively; not knowing where the next ten minutes will take you keeps things surprising and unexpected.

Time seemed to warp between skits — some ended too abruptly, and with others I couldn’t wait until the lights dimmed and it was onto the next. This time-travelling emphasized the skits that were most entertaining, as well as those that sat on the other end of the spectrum. The highlights of the night were the two comedic skits, the last of which was the most simplistic in its use of staging and premise but received the most positive audience reaction.

In it, a woman dressed only in a picnic blanket and a tree branch explored ‘how to be a tree’ in a dumbfounding but incredibly clever and hilarious approach.

The first skit seconds of the night also featured a single performer with similarly simplistic staging. Opening with a single man spouting ominous and rumbling vocals, it seemed to endure for 1200 seconds, not 600.

It plunged the audience straight into a vigorous course of twisted music therapy and sensory overload paired with simple black and white imagery as its background. Although thoughtfully put together, it was easily the night’s lowlight due to its failure to capture the audience’s attention and its almost-inexplicable language. It left the audience alienated from the performance, struggling to understand it, let alone appreciate it.

With plenty of audience participation throughout the night to boot, 600 Seconds encompasses an incredibly impressive mixture of scripted shenanigans, dance numbers and metaphors exploring life, love and, simply ‘what it means to be a tree’.

600 Seconds runs until the February 6 at The Blue Room Theatre, Northbridge. Tickets are available here.

Rachel Wills and Sian Choyce, two local standup comedians, comprise this familiarly named duo, making it clear within the first few minutes that they’re playing on the name of famous sitcom ‘2 Broke Girls’. Their energy and eagerness to have a bit of fun is apparent in their introduction, which fell flat on the sparse audience of 20-or-so in front of them.

The jokes — all very loosely tied together, jumping between topics without tying up loose ends — were a hit and miss. Both performers seemed to alienate the ten men in the audience by putting them down at any given opportunity, all until Wills kissed her volunteer from the crowd, causing the biggest and best reaction from the audience in the whole 45 minute set.

Ad-libbed remarks made by Wills and Choyce were a highlight. Latecomers had no chance of guiltily sliding into their seats; all attention was turned to one man who was quickly labelled “every guy from Freo ever”, which scored some laughs from the audience and perked up the girls’ enthusiasm.

The overall feel of the night was awkward. The audience response was incredibly minimal as Wills and Choyce attempted to play off the crowd wherever they could manage. The rambling, incoherent style of both performers was frustrating, leaving the audience feeling lost, evidenced by smatterings of subtle giggles and, sometimes, eerie silences

Unfortunately, the whole set was a stiff standoff between performer and audience and an awkward exploration of topics including ‘boat people’, ‘grooming pubic hair’, ‘Kim Jong Un playing netball’ and ‘mental health memes’.

In what was perhaps an attempt to excuse their performance, the girls apologetically mumbled at the end of the show that they were “all over the place tonight”.

2 Joke Girls is Mills and Choyce’s first collaboration, and for what it’s worth, the audience was appreciative of their performance, albeit eager to leave before the promised 55 minutes was up.

2 Joke Girls runs until the 31^st of January 2016 at the Fremantle Town Hall. Tickets are available here.