Melbourne International Comedy Festival: Ben Pobjie on the pleasure and pain of creating a new show

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Melbourne International Comedy Festival: Ben Pobjie on the pleasure and pain of creating a new show

By Ben Pobjie

In the long, painful process of creating a comedy festival show, there is always one moment that is nothing but joy, delight and the beauty of artistic fulfilment. That moment is the one when you have the idea to do a comedy festival show. Oh, it's a wonderful feeling. In that singular, shining instant, the creative fire burns in your veins and anything is possible. It lasts about a second.

But for that second, it is all so simple. "I have this great idea," you say to yourself. "It is fresh, it is funny, it will showcase my comedic sensibilities and catch the eye of the punters with its originality and unique spin on life." In your mind's eye, you see it coming together seamlessly, material and delivery meshing with uncommon perfection to create the festival triumph you've always known you had in you. All you have to do is write it, perform it, and let the awards and lucrative TV offers roll in. Too easy.

Writer and comedian Ben Pobjie at Melbourne Town Hall, home of the Melbourne International Comedy Festival.

Writer and comedian Ben Pobjie at Melbourne Town Hall, home of the Melbourne International Comedy Festival.Credit: Pat Scala

The first snag occurs in the writing. Your idea is, undoubtedly, masterful, but somehow every time you try to get it down on paper it scurries away and hides in a dark corner of your brain, leaving in its place a leaden collection of clumsy, drab words that bear a superficial resemblance to that glorious idea you once had, but on closer inspection are an irretrievable bundle of rancid cowpats. You rewrite, you refine, you tweak. You get up on stage and tentatively test a little of the material out. You find that rancid cowpats do not necessarily become less rancid when delivered to five people in a pub.

At this stage you get the sneaking feeling you've forgotten something. After a little thought it strikes you: a venue. It is an unfortunate element of the Melbourne International Comedy Festival that it still requires all performers to have a place to perform in. Ideally, you want one of the coveted "festival-managed venues": given that this would be ideal, it naturally doesn't happen. The Festival knocks you back, and you look elsewhere for the perfect space. And luck is on your side! There are several excellent venues that would be happy to have you. And it only costs ... OK maybe luck isn't on your side. You've got a limited budget, because you've spent all your money on the poster of yourself pulling a stupid face that will be hung all around town for people to almost see out of the corner of their eye while they're looking at the one for Wil Anderson. You've also ordered a couple of thousand flyers, which you can use to harass people on the street with. If these people are rude, they won't even look at you: if they're polite, they'll throw the flyer in the bin 50 metres down the road.

No time to worry about flyers, though – you've finally found a venue, and the script is coming along. You feel good. You feel positive. You refine. You tweak. You get out and test the material on stage again. You come home and cry. You curse the day you ever had the stupid idea to do this stupid show in the first place. You make up your mind to quit comedy forever. And the next day, you get up and you rewrite the whole thing. You cram more jokes into its creaking husk. You're not sure whether it bears any resemblance to the idea you had, all those months ago, but you do know one thing: your show opens tonight and it's too late to pull out now.

You take a deep breath, you step onto the stage, and you start talking. May God have mercy on your soul.

Ben Pobjie is a Fairfax Media columnist. His show Smackweasel: A Memoir is at Bar Open, 317 Brunswick Street, Fitzroy, from April 10 (previews from April 8).

comedyfestival.com.au

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