REVIEW: Spyfinger! (NZ International Comedy Festival 2015)

May 14, 2015

Beware of this heart of (comedy) gold [by Matt Baker] Following the success of A Play About Space and A Show About Superheroes, Wellington-based award-winning theatre collective My Accomplice brings their latest show (about spies), Spyfinger!, to Auckland, following their Wellington season for the New Zealand International Comedy Festival. With incredibly (and necessary) detailed direction by collaborator Uther Dean; Alex Greig, […]

REVIEW: Faith (Eli Matthewson) (NZ International Comedy Festival 2015)

May 14, 2015

No Doubt [by Matt Baker] Religion is a goldmine for comedians. It’s also an easy target, which some exploit to disseminate their philosophical views, and while that’s perfectly valid in the comedy medium, it’s not the aim for Eli Matthewson. Instead, the concept of faith, or, more specifically, losing it, is a chance for Matthewson to simply expose not only some […]

REVIEW: National Treasure (Nic Sampson) (NZ International Comedy Festival 2015)

May 13, 2015

Working his way up [by Matt Baker] What does it mean to be a National Treasure? What is the criterion for nomination let alone winning? And who is so humbly honouring themselves? Comedian, actor, and head-writer for Jono and Ben, Nic Sampson, addresses all this and more in his New Zealand Comedy Festival show, National Treasure. With the help of Sam […]

REVIEW: Fly or Die (Hamish Parkinson) (NZ International Comedy Festival 2015)

May 13, 2015

Surreal Grandeur [by Matt Baker] There are a variety of ways in which artists create work, and while there are theoretical practices that can be employed in an attempt to ensure some form of artistic merit, such an outcome is never guaranteed. There will always be those who follow the rules, guidelines, and templates to great success, and then there are […]

REVIEW: Dark Side of the Afternoon (Ashton Brown and Louise Beuvink) (NZ International Comedy Festival 2015)

May 13, 2015

Good Schadenfreude to You [by Tim George] Ashton Brown and Louise Beuvink clearly know what they are doing. Each comic has  around 30 minutes for their set, and they both rise to the challenge in completely different, yet complimentary, ways. The show really should have been called ‘Schadenfreude – the Musical’, based on the subject matter and Ashton Brown’s gloriously half-assed […]

REVIEW: Snap, Crackle, Pop (Laura Daniel and Tom Sainsbury) (NZ International Comedy Festival 2015)

May 10, 2015

Meta-Comedy [by Matt Baker] Having contested in previous Raw Comedy Quests, Laura Daniel and Tom Sainsbury have an insight into the amateur comedy scene, but, as professional theatre practitioners, they also have an eye and an ear for what works and what doesn’t. This knowledge and awareness has been excellently deconstructed with great clarity in their meta-theatrical comedy show, Snap, Crackle, […]

REVIEW: Force Norman (NZ International Comedy 2015)

May 7, 2015

Revenge of the Nats  [by Matt Baker] If New Zealand’s political history lacks a flair for the dramatics, Billy T award-winning comedians Rhys Mathewson and Nick Gibb have certainly made up for it with their two-man, six-character, action-comedy Force Norman. Following fictional events sparked by equally fictional Minister of Defence Tim Tambly (Mathewson), presumably National party Prime Minister Wallace Norman (Gibb) […]

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