Remember Beached Az? That one joke online animated series from back when you could build an entire career around a single meme? It’s back! As the tenth anniversary of Beached Az loomed up, they decided to do another series. But this world is very different, and they could expect no more than a 24 hour... Read More »
TV Tonight’s recent article on the all-time best Australian TV comedies got us thinking…what are the all-time worst Australian TV comedies? Having been blogging about this for more than a decade, we think we have the answers. First up…sketch shows! If you grew up pre the late-90s, sketch shows were something you saw on TV... Read More »
“When it comes to sodomi, you can’t afford to be a tight-arse”. Would you look at that: an actual joke on an Australian comedy shown on ABC2. And from one of the guys behind Beached Az! We should just pack up and quit, clearly we’re in a world where all the old signposts mean nothing.... Read More »
Last time we checked, The Bolt Retort’s most viewed clip on YouTube had 1,623 views. The second most viewed clip? 206 views.... Read More »
Today has seen a variety of submissions being made to the Senate committee inquiry into ABC television internal programming cuts that have… kinda… zzz… Wait, what? Did someone mention The Chaser? Community and Public Sector Union ABC section secretary Graeme Thomson said on Monday there needed to be a full and open inquiry into the... Read More »
A year or so ago, when the iPad was released, there was a brief period in which a small number of well known local comedy groups, well, two local comedy groups - Working Dog and The Chaser - released their own apps. Now with smart phones and tablet computers to be found in every second person's bag, including our own, we assumed there must be stacks more Australian comedy apps to download.... Read More »
When we haven’t been having a chuckle at Hey Hey it’s Saturday being nominated for a “Most Popular Light Entertainment Program” Logie (what, they’re handing out Logies just for turning up now?), we’ve been having a semi-serious discussion here at Tumbleweed Central: why doesn’t Australian television make more comedy for teenagers? Put another way, when... Read More »
If you wanted to make an Australian television drama, or a soap opera, or a current affairs program, or a reality series about car repairs – basically, pretty much anything that isn’t a comedy – you probably wouldn’t go out and make a short film first. Somewhere down the line you’d shoot a pilot or... Read More »
In yet another indication that the future of entertainment is online, a recent-ish episode of the Mediaweek podcast revealed that Andrew Denton's production company Zapruder's Other Films has employed nine members of the Hungry Beast team to work on “online projects”. What exactly these projects are was not revealed; it's also not terribly clear at this stage what types of entertainment will work best in an online... Read More »
Every week for more than 20 years John Clarke has been writing two and a half minutes of some of the best satire you'll find anywhere in the world, which he performs with fellow satirist Bryan Dawe. Highly intelligent, stuffed with gags and brilliantly performed, this is at the pinnacle of comedy in this country – and as an insight into Australian politics it puts a lot of serious analysis to... Read More »