Australian comedy in 2014 did pretty much what it was expected to do: not all that much. The days of any local comedy connecting with a mass audience seem to have ended with the mass audience realising Chris Lilley only ever had one idea, while the ABC’s other crowd-pleasing mainstays either tossed off a half-arsed... Read More »
Surprisingly – or not, depending on how closely you’ve been paying attention – for a news satire the final episode of Shaun Micallef’s Mad as Hell contained a lot of swipes at other comedy shows. And well deserved swipes at that, whether the targets were lazy ABC “comedy” panel shows (the ‘Blather’ sketch even contained... Read More »
From the ABC’s press release trumpeting their 2015 line-up: Comedian CHARLIE PICKERING returns to ABC to present a news comedy show that promises to be opinionated and outspoken Well, at least they didn’t say “funny”. According to websites much closer to actual news sites than ours: Humorist and self-avowed political junkie Charlie Pickering will host... Read More »
Nice things: we just can’t say enough of them about Shaun Micallef. It’s not just that he (and his trusty regular cohorts, co-star Francis Greenslade and writers Gary McCaffrie and Michael Ward) are funny: he’s hard working too. Not for him vanishing for a few years in some behind-the-scenes gig or personal project no-one ever... Read More »
First you have this*: Regardless of the content of the show, simply by choosing to wear ‘racial drag’ Lilley has put his work in the company of pieces of entertainment history as regrettable as the Al Jolson Minstrel Show. Yet for the most part we seem at peace with one of Australian TV’s favorite sons... Read More »
Mad As Hell will probably be back next year - maybe even this year – so this is (hopefully) not a goodbye, merely an... Read More »
This is Littleton is a new four-part sketch show set in the municipal offices of the fictional City of Littleton. It treads well-worn ground in TV sketch in that it features recurring characters and is set in the... Read More »
Hey, the cast are in the opening credits now! Micallef doesn’t have the beard he was sporting in all the promos! There’s the Micallef Tonight sign! And a bunch of political observations that are actually funny! Yes, Mad as Hell is back and it continues to be good. Oh sure, there are always quibbles to... Read More »
Was 2013 a good year for Australian comedy? Of course not – comedy hasn’t had a good year in this country since, oh, let’s say 1994, just to make it a nice round twenty years of decline. Yes, individual comics have had good years and individual shows have made a splash, but come on: comedy... Read More »
What our voters are saying about Mad As... Read More »