Almost Off Topic

The Melbourne International Comedy Festival Starts This Week!

… yeah, we’re not going to be covering it. It’s fairly obvious from the content of this blog that live comedy is not our thing. Then again, we shouldn’t assume that anything here is “fairly obvious”: it’s also fairly obvious that this blog is written by a team of people (we’ve even had guest posters),... Read More »

The Future Of Comedy Will Cost You Plenty

Now that their target has been reached, we can now safely direct your attention to the crowdfunding campaign to support A Rational Fear in their efforts to “commission a 10-week season of digital comedy to fill the void of political satire in this country.” Does anyone really think there’s a “void of political satire in... Read More »

Raking through the leaves of bad dramedy

Dramedy has killed comedy. Where once we made out-and-proud sitcoms which aimed for laughs, now we make dramedies where the potential for comedy is sacrificed to ensure there’s room for moving bits, or tense bits, or realistic... Read More »

What we read on our holidays

One of the books we read during our January break was John Safran’s Murder in Mississippi, and while it’s not exactly a comedy it is Safran’s first book and it came about as a result of his comedy, so we thought we’d post a quick... Read More »

Comedy: It Only Works If You’re Funny

So it seems Helen Razer has quit the high-stress world of online op-ed writing: I have written capably to a large audience for some time for next-to-nothing. I made a contribution that was not without merit. And one to which you are no longer entitled. Because you give me shit and pay me shit. Wait,... Read More »

The reality of the situation

Take a look at the cast of Celebrity Splash, alongside the usual reality TV role-call of presenters, actors, sportspeople and Brynne Edelsten are four figures from the world of... Read More »

And one more thing…

You could make a fairly strong argument that Tractor Monkeys is just Spicks & Specks, Talkin’ ‘bout Your Generation and maybe The White Room all combined in to one... Read More »

What Hillsy did next

Looks like In Gordon Street Tonight must have got the arse - how else to explain the plethora of Adam Hills projects in the UK at the... Read More »

The One That Takes Four Paragraphs To Get To The Point

Being the committed couch-dwellers that we are, stand-up comedy isn’t exactly something we cover all that often here. But even we were slightly surprised to see that this year’s Melbourne International Comedy Festival has once again paired up with The Herald-Sun (Melbourne’s News Ltd tabloid) as its major media partner. Why, wasn’t it only last... Read More »

Congratulations to all the 2011 AACTA Winners!

… no, we’re not being sarcastic. Though you’d be forgiven for thinking so, as those winners – well, the only winners who fall under our gaze here – happen to be Chris Lilley (for best performance in a comedy) and Laid (for best comedy series). Suffice to say we wouldn’t have been voting for them... Read More »