Hughesy Loses It

Yesterday’s episode of Australian Story focusing on Dave Hughes was business as usual. This kind of show – at one point Hughes was driving around Warnambool pointing out his old haunts like an episode of Julia Zemerio’s unlamented Home Delivery – is all about promoting a certain image of the celebrity involved. Is Dave Hughes a loveable family man with a troubled past he’s struggled to overcome? Fuck yeah he is!

Unless, of course, you were actually paying attention. Hughesy’s rep has taken a bit of a battering in recent years, mostly from own goals like his many pro-Covid rants during Victoria’s lockdowns or his swooping in to buy one of the houses on The Block seemingly on a whim. Pro tip: regular fair dinkum Aussie blokes don’t usually have a couple of million burning a hole in their back pocket when they just happen to be driving past a building site.

But you don’t get to be at the top of the Australian comedy tree for decades at a time without knowing a thing or two about media management. This year we’ve already seen Hughesy on I’m A Celebrity being likable while eating bugs in the jungle (not a euphemism). In a fortnight or so he’ll be doing his thing on the new series of Taskmaster, just as he’s settling in for a string of gigs at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival (just don’t be talking in the front row). What better time to remind everyone that yes, he’s a loveable family man with a troubled past he’s struggled to overcome?

The premise of this episode was that Hughesy had given up the booze only to replace it with a relentless drive to succeed. Sounds like a good trade! By pretty much every possible metric, he has succeeded. So with nowhere to go as far as the end of the story was concerned, all the new news came at the start. If you didn’t think much of Hughesy before, guess what? You’re a heartless bastard: he survived a harrowing childhood where his drunk gun-toting dad made it an open question whether he’d live or die!

Anyone still breathing would feel more than sympathetic towards someone going through that kind of shocking ordeal. Anyone who’s followed Hughesy’s comedy career would be like “huh”. It definitely helps explain his relentless drive to succeed. But considering he’s obviously succeeded in pretty much every way possible, that’s the end of that. Maybe if he was a very different kind of comedian we’d be like “wow, can’t wait to see how he addresses his personal struggles in his act”, but c’mon: it’s Hughesy.

Beyond that, we got plenty of the usual. Hughesy managing to be both dux of his high school and spending a year working in an abattoir? Hughesy’s old school mates who all somehow look years – decades – younger than him? Someone saying with a straight face “that was when Hughesy found his comedy voice” without immediately going “you know, ehhhhhhhhhhhhhh O’m angriiiiiii”? Hughesy’s big break in making the leap from community radio Triple R (where he was a weekly guest) to the newly launched Nova FM as part of their “Hughesy, Kate and Dave” breakfast team? Hang on, what happened to Dave?

And that’s the problem with this kind of promotional video. There’s always a piece of the puzzle that doesn’t quite fit. Maybe it’s the way the breakfast radio promo photos mysteriously go from three wacky funsters to two. Maybe it’s Hughesy’s wife saying “he’s got this bogan persona, but really he’s a vegan who meditates”. At least he spends lots of time with the kids now, unlike – it’s hinted at – years ago when they were little and he was even more driven to succeed.

That bit was presumably left in because it fits with the “Hughesy’s got problems” narrative. Or at least, it does until you remember his half hour comedy special Hughes the Boss, which aired on Nine in 2016 and revolved largely around footage of his kids. Being too busy to hang with the kids because you’ve got a Footy Show appearance to prepare for is one thing; still finding time to do a half hour special on how annoying they are is another thing entirely.

So, on the one hand Hughesy has built a massively successful comedy career on being just a regular Aussie bloke constantly enraged befuddled by suburban life. On the other, he’s actually a millionaire teetotal vegan who’s been mainlining inspirational quotes since he was a teen and thinks being driven to succeed is a likable trait. But is it?

When Rove tells us that Hughes was on the outer with the cool kids in the Melbourne comedy scene back in the mid 90s because he cracked “confronting” jokes about sex workers, anyone who knows anything about the 90s is like “hang on, back then Greg Fleet was doing entire shows about being a junkie while also being a junkie and everyone loved him”.

Then again, Fleet doesn’t have soulless staring dead eyes that are gaping portals into a hell devoid of all meaning or sanity, which probably counts for something.