IN case you hadn’t noticed, The Melbourne International Comedy Festival is in town, and right across Melbourne blokes are fostering laughter from their failures – sexual, emotional, financial and various other types ending in ‘‘al’’.
But away from the spotlight, just what do some of the country’s funniest men ‘really’ think about relationship issues such as dating, de facto relationships and heartbreak? And when they’re not trying to score laughs from their mistakes and misfortune, how vulnerable are they?
Adam Zwar – star and co-creator of cult SBS hit Wilfred and ABC sitcom Lowdown – has made it his mission to find out; the result, six-part series Agony Uncles, already has a strong following.
The premise is simple – each week, a relationship-based topic is chosen (episode one was ‘‘the single man’’, next week’s is ‘‘moving in’’) and a host of well known faces spill their (metaphorical) guts. ‘‘Their wisdom will now become your wisdom,’’ Zwar explains in the show’s opening sequence, and while he’s overplaying it for gags, truth be told there’s plenty of bare-faced honesty to be had.
Most of the advice-dispensing uncles are mates of Zwar’s from the comedy circuit, such as stand-ups Lawrence Leung, Lawrence Mooney, Scott Brennan and Tim Ross. Commentator and The Project regular Waleed Aly, Sports Fever! co-host Sam Pang and actors Josh Lawson and Damian Walshe-Howling are regulars … and as for the presence of former Carlton president John Elliott, I can’t explain that one either.
Given Agony Uncles is structured as half-hour packages of talking head interviews, it’s imperative that the interview subjects have interesting things to say. And, for the most part, they do. Last week, Mooney recalled cheating on his girlfriend while she slept in another room – and relaying this story to somebody on a first date. Lawson looked mortified as he revealed how a blind date left the pub in a cab after spotting him from across the room, all the while telling him on the phone that she was at the pub but couldn’t find him.
Aly dobbed in a friend whose mention of children on a first dinner date forced his date to put a premature end to the evening.
Next week, the team tackle that watershed moment of any relationship – moving in. Who does the cooking? Who does the cleaning? When do you pop the question? (‘‘get married in the first year or two, when you still like them,’’ offers Ross helpfully) And just how do you leave the toilet seat?
Men in need of advice or women looking to decipher mixed messages (or no messages at all) from their partners, take heed – Agony Uncles’ no-bull approach to life may prove as compelling as every other self-help show on the box combined.
ABC1, Wednesday, 9.30pm.
