What is it with comedians getting all cathartic and emotional in their old age on shows like Anh Do’s Brush with Fame? Arguably, the rot started a decade ago with Enough Rope, where Andrew Denton asked famous people uber researched questions designed to make them cry. Most of them did (although props to Judith Lucy who famously... Read More »
One of the advantages sketch comedy has over comedy serials is that producers can re-order them easily. Got lots of funny sketches in episode 2 but less in episode 5? Move some of the strong material from episode 2 to episode 5! Sure, it doesn’t make the series funnier overall, but it at least it... Read More »
What kind of mangled, dead-inside, meths-drinking husk would you have to be to watch Gruen week after week? What possible joy could you have left in your life that watching an endless hategasm pumping black spooge over the very idea of “community” in the name of making a quick buck was worth your while? “How... Read More »
One of the things that’s probably too obvious to be worth mentioning but it’s a pretty dry period for comedy at the moment so here goes is that the days of single-theme comedy shows are all but over. Remember that nightmarish period where it seemed everyone was trying to do “Spicks & Specks, but with... Read More »
We’ve always been a bit nonplussed about Soul Mates, which returned to the ABC last night. It’s neither especially bad nor especially good comedy, but with its recurring characters and serial structure, it is at least an interesting take on the sketch show. Returning in series 2 are the Bondi Hipsters, Dom and Adrian, who’ve... Read More »
What is there to say as we wave goodbye to another year of Mad as Hell that we haven’t said at least four times before? Much as we’d prefer to have Micallef end each season with a Charlie Pickering-like threat of a guaranteed return, the fact that each series of Mad as Hell could be... Read More »
If you thought the Australian television comedy scene was dead at the moment, well, sometimes dead is better: Get patriotic on the Aussie comedy day with Open Slather (Seasons 1 & 2), Just for Laughs Australia 2015, Best of the Sydney Comedy Fest 2016, and Melbourne Comedy Festival’s Big Three-Oh! 2016. If you missed Open... Read More »
It’s the start of a new financial year, and we all know what that means: Australia’s various film and television funding bodies reveal where the money went! Considering how often we’re told that funding is essential to the development and production of film and television in this country you’d figure these lists would be a... Read More »
There’s been a bit of talk in the past year about whether this country’s political journalists are doing a good job or not… From New Matilda: ABC journalist Annabel Crabb last night began her sickeningly sweet profile of former Immigration Minister and current Treasurer Scott Morrison like this: “People describe Scott Morrison as ambitious, hard-line,... Read More »
The people of this country may have delivered an inconclusive result this election, but one thing was certain: politics provided a lot of inspiration to our comedians. Australian Tumbleweed’s specially assembled panel of top analysts (You mean our usual writers – Ed) take a look at the results… The Chaser were back with another of... Read More »