with Brian Nankervis as Neil Armstrong & Rusty Berther as Andre the Giant

I wasn’t planning on going to this one, but have seen Damian around the festival a bit seeing other people’s shows and enjoyed his reading of his grandmother’s diary on David Bridie’s album. When I saw the guests for this one I decided to go as I missed seeing Rockwiz on Good Friday this year and had not seen Brian Nankervis for a while.

The premise of the show is that the usual rules of time and space do not exist and any two historical figures can be friends who appear on a talk show and go through various segments. All these segments are improvised with recorded introductions and sometimes a random prop.

Brian was a good choice to be Neil Armstrong as he is big on making speeches and good with working with an audience. I could tell when he was going into one of his bits, I even immortalised some of his crowd work in a book I worked on last year, there is an entire photospread on the “Come on Barbie, let’s go party!” gag.

I knew Rusty Berther was going to be Andre the Giant way too early in the clues, might have come up as a bit loud on the recording they are doing for the podcast (I can recognise my laugh on them). Rusty surely leant into the absurdity of a person of his size pretending to be someone very much larger. Luckily he did not attempt the accent. I already knew quite a lot of the stuff about Andre the Giant from previous interest in him and also the doco.

There were some interesting segments in the show like the retelling of the Darwin beer can regatta where Andre the Giant was drinking the cans to build the craft while participating in the race, which he only started doing half an hour before given the amount of cans he drinks. Thankfully there were some can props for Rusty to demonstrate (that was a very small can). None of this will come through on the podcast, all the more reason to go.

I would recommend this one if you want something to go to in the early afternoon and would like to get an early dinner or even go home and come back. It is also a show you can bring people without having to worry about the content of the show or that someone is going to be too edgy in their comments.

An excellent show and worth going to more than once if you like different guests on different weeks. There is a special deal if you go to multiple shows.

Rating: 5/5

Show details:

Tickets: https://www.comedyfestival.com.au/2024/shows/damian-callinan-unlikely-friends

JOINING DAMIAN IN THE HISTORY MOSH PIT:

Saturday March 30 – Tom Gleeson & Dane Simpson

Sunday March 31 – Wil Anderson & Gillian Cosgriff

Saturday April 6 – Jason Geary & Rik Brown

Sunday April 7 – Geraldine Hickey & Andy McLelland

Saturday April 13 – Elf Lyons & Kirsty Webeck

Sunday April 14 – Brian Nankervis & Rusty Berther

Saturday April 20 – Michelle Brasier & Claire Hooper

Sunday April 21 – Sami Shah & Ivan Aristeguieta

Price:

Adult: All Tix $39.00

Group (6+): All Tix $34.00

Concession: All Tix $31.00

Preview: All Tix $29.00

Times and dates:

Sat 30 Mar & Sun 31 Mar: 3pm;

Sat 6 Apr & Sun 7 Apr: 3pm;

Sat 13 Apr & Sun 14 Apr: 3pm;

Sat 20 Apr & Sun 21 Apr: 3pm

Comedy Republic, 231 Bourke St, Melbourne

Show length: 50 Minutes