COMEDIANS FIGHT PREJUDICE WITH LAUGHTER

“Stereotypes – I think that’s [the reason] why I needed to be in comedy… It’s all about expression, and I think being able to express yourself in life, it really releases you from a lot of things you have tied up inside…”

Shiralee Hood speaks to me from the tour van with her fellow comedian Dane Simpson, bumping along to Sydney for the next show of their historic 49 date tour at Redfern’s Giant Dwarf Theatre, after shows in South Australia and regional Victoria. Elatedly, they tell me about the range of audience reactions they’ve experienced in different towns, and the time they have to workshop their comedy on the road.

This isn’t your average troupe of comedians; Shiralee and Dane are with the Aboriginal Comedy Allstars. The group came together through their shared experiences and decided to team up to bring their utterly unique and cheeky comedy experience to the country. They first toured last year with Shiralee and fellow founding members Kevin Kropinyeri, Matt Ford and Andy Saunders.

Shiralee and Kevin met through Deadly Funny, a national competition program run through Melbourne International Comedy Festival and the only one to exclusively support budding Aboriginal and Torres Straight Islander talent. Dane came up through the program last year and joins the Aboriginal Comedy Allstars this year in place of Andy (who will only be joining the tour this time for the special Giant Dwarf show). “We heard a lot of people talking about [Dane], and when we saw him we just thought he was a hilarious person who would be brilliant for the group,” said Shiralee.

“I get to learn heaps and I’m touring around with people who are absolutely masters of their craft,” explained Dane. “I get to hone my craft a lot quicker than a lot of guys get to… it’s 100% a fantastic opportunity for me.”

“It’s actually a way for Aboriginal people to get on stage and say ‘Hey, this is what’s actually going on, this is what it’s actually all about’,” Deadly Funny Program Producer Wes Snelling would later tell me. “There’s a lot of comedy audiences that may not have seen an Aboriginal person in the flesh, that is a ridiculous reality but it’s true… it’s about access with each other, not being frightened of each other.”

The Sydney heat of Deadly Funny will take place this weekend, preceded by a two-hour workshop where the Allstars’ Andy Saunders will join in assisting aspiring comedians to refine their material. Wes explained: “It’s almost script development, but you don’t have to have a script, you might just have a joke, and get advice on how to work up to the punch line… it’s a case by case scenario.”

Snelling added: “I love Deadly Funny because 99.99999% of the time that I come across any Aboriginal person who is telling me a story, a) I laugh, and b) it is so strong with content that is passionate, something that really comes from within and with a deeper meaning than anything I’ve experienced before.”

The Allstars don’t necessarily seek to be political in their material, but an Aboriginal person’s identity is itself political within our society, so the very act of sharing their stories carries a certain progressive charge.

As Dane explained: “Me in particular, I just do stories about my family and growing up and funny little yarns, places where I’ve been and come from, we do comedy but with an Aboriginal flavour, we don’t necessarily do ‘Aboriginal jokes’, its just us being us, and I think that that breaks down stereotypes.”

Shiralee shared that as “a dark-skinned Aboriginal”, she is always aware of prejudice. She has experienced being stopped on the way into the backstage of a venue when her lighter-skinned co-stars have been allowed in ahead of her: “They’ll say ‘Oh I’m sorry only the entertainment is [allowed] back here’ – [but] I am the entertainment.”

“There’s a lot of stereotypes that are put up when you first meet [some non-Aboriginal people], but afterwards they’re apologising and shouting me a drink or something…which is really good,” Shiralee remarked. “I talk about that in my shows, because it’s different when you’re living in black Australia, you’re treated differently, and comedy just helps me be able to talk about it and then laugh at the changes. Education through comedy and laughter is the most substantial way I’ve seen.”

As a writer, actor and associate producer on the ABC’s sketch comedy series Black Comedy, Nikkiah Liu is another firm believer in the power of laugher and entertainment as tools for social change. As she later explained: “I think the more complexity we have in our society with whose stories we tell and whose voices we hear and which people we see can only do us good because our media, our entertainment, our stories and our art should reflect who we are as a society.”

Nikkiah added: “I think we often see equality as assimilation or equality as your colour not being seen, but it’s not about being colour blind… or colour not mattering to who you are, it’s about your colour not being detrimental, not being completely who you are, not having people making assumptions about you because of your race…”

Much like in the Allstars’ comedy, Nikkiah and the Black Comedy writers riff off racist stereotypes in their sketches. Recently, Channel 9 television series Here Come The Habibs was slammed for the way it was perceived to pander to racist stereotypes of Middle Eastern Australians. But as Nikkiah explained, these stereotypes need to be acknowledged to be addressed – and the context, the people telling the joke and who is ultimately being laughed at is key.

“I thought it was really interesting that there was people going ‘Oh that’s really offensive!’ when they haven’t actually seen the [Habibs’] story or the context…that show is created by men of that diaspora and a lot of the commentary was coming from white people,” said Nikkiah. “One of the things I always found interesting [about the response to Black Comedy] was having non-Indigenous people ask me, ‘Is it ok to laugh?’…”

But as she explained, everyone is invited to laugh: “This idea of ‘Hey, laugh with us, engage with us’ – an element of that is ‘Care about us, care about us enough to be an ally and support change for our lives to be equal to yours!’ If our stories aren’t representing us, then what use are they?”

Ahead of their show in Redfern this weekend, Dane and Shiralee were looking ahead to the response they hope to see at Giant Dwarf after last year’s critical acclaim. “I’d love the [Indigenous] community up there to feel really proud of having some Aboriginal comics come and rock it, and for non-Aboriginal people that come to the show I hope they really enjoy it,” said Dane.

“I’d love [audiences] to walk out of the Giant Dwarf elated, inspired and ready to have conversations with Aboriginal people after seeing our perspectives and having a great laugh,” Shiralee added. “A lot of people have walked out of our shows and said their guts hurt [from laughing], and their cheeks hurt from smiling, and we know that they’ve had a brilliant time.”

ABORIGINAL COMEDY ALLSTARS
Sunday Feb 28, 7pm. Giant Dwarf, 199 Cleveland Street, Redfern. $25. Tickets & info: giantdwarf.com.au or comedyallstars.com.au 

DEADLY FUNNY SYDNEY
Saturday Feb 27. Workshop: 4–6pm. Performance: 7pm. Redfern Community Centre, 29-53 Hugo Street, Redfern. Free. Registration to compete or sit in the audience: deadlyfunny.com.au 

BLACK COMEDY Series 2 airs Wednesday nights on ABC TV at 9.02pm. Catch up on episodes at iview.abc.net.au