Shots Fired

Adrienne Truscott (2013 Edin­burgh Fringe Pan­el prizewinner)

“I would’ve said [Tony] Abbott, because his tone-deaf­ness makes it so easy, and after the George Bush years an Amer­ic­an could basic­ally recycle the same jokes with a quick name change! But that’s too lazy, and for my pur­poses Bill Cosby’s hubris is a pretty rich source for satire at the moment.”

Ask­ing For It

Tue 5 May – Sat 9 May @ 8.30pm

Fringe Bar

Thom Adams (Writer: Pub­lic Ser­vice Announce­ments)

“When you really explore the world that the main­stream media (or any media, really) depicts, it’s bat-shit insane! All of the ways we look at the world around us — the news, talk shows, even adverts — they’re all this dis­tor­ted reflec­tion of real­ity which is so much fun to explore. The world is absurd, and comedi­ans should embrace it.”

Who Dunne It? — Pub­lic Ser­vice Announcements

Tue 12 May – Sat 16 May @ 9pm

BATS Theatre

Tim Batt (2015 Billy T James Com­edy Award nominee)

“Fam­ily val­ues polit­ic­al parties and organ­isa­tions. Basic­ally, if you have the word ‘fam­ily’ in your name, I assume you are doing some very yucky stuff. The amount of red-in-the-face blow­hards that get caught out for doing dis­gust­ing stuff to vul­ner­able people is pretty mind-blow­ing. Also, by exten­sion, tel­ev­an­gel­ist preach­ers in Amer­ica. They’re the most entertaining/dangerous people around.”

Tim Batt Explores the Human Condition

Sat 25 April – Sat 16 May @ 8.15pm

Monte­cristo (Auck­land only, sorry)

Jen O’Sullivan (Improviser/producer)

“There’s this idea that people like Paul Henry, Mike Hosk­ing and Sean Plun­ket are rebels, bravely just say­ing what everyone’s think­ing, when really they’re simply regur­git­at­ing the hard­line status quo atti­tudes of con­ser­vat­ism while cheers-ing them­selves on their thought lead­er­ship. Of course they’re prime tar­gets for satire — someone’s got to crash their party.”

Def­in­itely Not The Babysit­ters’ Club

Tue 28 April – Sat 2 May @ 7pm 

BATS Theatre

Comedi­an Deconstruction

Fri 1, 8 and 15 May, Sat 2, 9 and 16 May @ 10pm 

Fringe Bar

Of course this column, among oth­er things, is an excuse to explore my favour­ite tar­get — politi­cians. From Win­ston Peters grand­stand­ing up in North­land to Peter Dunne’s battles with rel­ev­ance. From Labour’s battles with Labour to John Key’s battles with his own memory. Hav­ing just returned from trav­el­ling the world, I’m look­ing for­ward to get­ting on stage and show­ing audi­ences a few of the more enter­tain­ing parts of Aus­tralia and the Unites States. It’s refresh­ing just how ridicu­lous our politi­cians can be in the grand scheme. And also how ser­i­ously we take these elec­ted offi­cials. I heard a friend in New York explain­ing to Amer­ic­ans that Win­ston is the Barack Obama of Kiwi polit­ics. Think about that for a second…

Next month, some actu­al ser­i­ous issues — but for now, I hope you’ll go out and sup­port loc­al com­edy, invest­ig­ate over­seas acts you might not have heard of, and enjoy a decent laugh at those in power.

James Nokise

Big Words

Tue 12 May – Sat 16 May @ 7pm

VK’s Com­edy and Blues Bar