Peter Helliar - Frisky - @Newtown - 07/10/05

Ethan Switch - Sunday, 9 October, 2005 - Print Version

Keep them waiting. Forget the time, that's irrelevant. Start about an hour after the post and even then, don't come out first. Instead, send out another man to warm the crowd up. A few of them are sleeping off the week. Others getting well blotto for the upcoming weekend. Others still are actually looking forward to the in between. Whatever and wherever that is.

Some band is on muffle down on Level One. Level Two of @Newtown is spacious, seats all over the place and people lining the walls. On and on the people look for seats in the dark. An hour of this continues with the band playing songs and singing with a forgettable beat in a familiar sound.

Triple M jock, Paul Calleja, walks in with The Killers' Somebody Told Me blaring out the ears. Calleja is a man who breaks a healthy sweat as if sitting over a hot plate of sizzling capsicums or a boiling bowl of pesto. Major force in the forehead shine. The sheer fear on his face is evident. A woman in the seventh row props his many jokes. Jokes that fall dead with laughs out of pity and sobriety. Sweating is constant and Calleja wipes it into his scalp for that glinty staleness.

Calleja is a comedian that inspires others to comedy. Three in the tenth row take his twenty or so minute set to heart and strike up a rough routine and troupe mechanics that they would see themselves up on stage delivering.

Intermission brings about nothing for the space between the comics. Broken thin and crispy pizza crusts in the shirt pocket find their way out and onto the floor. How they got there in the first place will stay back at the corporate building devoid of denim on a Friday night.

The man from the poster outside and Rove Live, Peter Helliar, finally makes an appearance as he shreds the ear drums with Warrant's Cherry Pie over levels of decency. It was this or Def Leppard's Pour Some Sugar On Me. A vocal few cry out for the latter.

Apart from a few swift kicks into the groin, the material spins nothing around the theme of "frisky," if indeed that's a theme to even believe. Krispy Kreme, non-actioning strike actions from the public transport, pregnancy and seafood taking a few points of the hour.

Helliar dishes out a drunken call to one Paul Horn of Ecolabs. Mobile phone from a man in the front row. Hookers and cocaine all over the Oxford Koala bringing the action up. Segues between the material is often abrupt, though keeping with an overall loop back of reference.

Two women over on the side talking through the final minutes of the set find the spotlight on them. One slowly remembers working in law reform while the other is a gay comedienne with a chip on her shoulder. The chip coming from an altercation between herself and Helliar at a comedy competition. Presumably Helliar having told her that as an out gay comic the niche would serve her well. "Like telling a mediocre Olympian that they'd be a fantastic Paralypian if only they lopped off their arm," she explains.

Jodie Eckett or Jody Ekit (Whatever, does it really matter? Does she?) takes up Helliar's challenge of closing out the show and strikes up the stage for five minutes. Bitter shots of an aspirant are the main barbs of spitfire through tales behind the coffee counter. Hate and pain the core of the set. Volume, though, is rather low. Off even. The crowd is testy though remains largely silent. This for the jokes or for the audio, doesn't make a difference either way.

A roadie picks up on the sound and helps Helliar bring the show to a close singing the theme from The Golden Girls, "Thank You For Being A Friend". Overall an entertaining night with a fairly tough wade through the first half.

No help from the establishment with the lights for the departing many remain on low and chairs stand in the way.