Day 26 - June 29th

Day 26 - June 29th
Rhino party for Adelaide Comedy 12th Bday
Apparently got kicked out of EC
Ruthless
Ruthless
Ruthless
so drunk

        Rhino Room was and still remains the epicentre of the earthquake that is Adelaide Comedy. As it happens, earthquakes aren't taken very seriously in Adelaide: in 2011 there was a small one recorded which woke people in the middle of the night and led to a bunch of reports in the media. Reports to who? No idea mate. Nothing major/whatsoever was damaged, but they kept talking about 'reports' in the paper, and those people don't lie. A meme did the rounds on the frantic hive that is Adelaide Facebook, it pictured an outdoor setting – four plastic picnic chairs around a picnic table on a sunny patch of grass – with one of the chairs tipped haphazardly on its side. The caption: 'Adelaide Earthquake: We WILL Rebuild'.
        And that's about how seriously Adelaide takes its comedy scene as well.

        It's a bummer, because the Adelaide comedy scene could be great. The old Rhino Room on Frome St was the first place I ever did stand up; they have the open mic on Mondays where you have to bring three friends to perform, and then there are (or at least there were in 2012) pro shows on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights. The room was a little 80-seater and the shows, run by Adelaide Comedy, were almost always great – super supportive audiences with a great range of styles. The problem with the scene was that there was never anywhere else to go outside of these shows, which is the worst possible situation for new comics starting out in the city, as the only way to improve is to keep getting on stage.

        Sadly this situation doesn't seem set to improve any time soon, as the one booker who has maintained a withering stranglehold over the lumbering institution that is Adelaide Comedy refuses to book anyone who performs on shows other than his. He claims that more shows in the city would harm his own, even if the other shows were on different nights of the week and not in direct competition with his. He frames this policy as being for the good of comedy as a whole – rubbish. The city could ONLY benefit from more shows.
        Since I was there in 2012 the number has dwindled, and any comics who might rise to a point where they could challenge him by starting new rooms and promoting them to a new audience inevitably move away from the city. There have been a few rooms pop up sporadically over the last five years, but they have only ever been short lived, and cannot compete with the main draw of the Rhino Room, which everyone in Adelaide considers the Spiritual Home of Comedy by default. Meanwhile generations of new comics are born at the Rhino Room open mic, and fall in love with comedy in a city that simply does not have a sufficiently diverse comedy scene to support their development. They leave for Melbourne or Sydney, only later realising that the institution they were taught to idolize when they were too new and full of wonder to question anything, was actually the reason for their frustration and lack of opportunity. The forest must burn down in order for new trees to grow, and as long as the current state of affairs stands, Adelaide will remain the worst city for comedy in the country.
        Fuck, I really went off on one there huh... sorry. That shit just really upsets me.

        On the night of Adelaide Comedy's 12th birthday I remember watching a comic called Dave Williams do a set – maybe even the closing set on the show? – and it being the best live comedy I'd ever seen at that point. I told him so that night, and actually years later I ran into him at a show in Sydney and said something to the effect of, “Hey man remember me! I didn't quit, check it out!”
        That show at Rhino was the first time I'd really felt like a part of the comedy community. I felt like it might be important to Dave Williams that I enjoyed his set, because being at that show made me feel like a comic, and the opinion of a comic, I thought, would mean more to him than that of a lowly audience member (or 'audient', if you will). He was nice enough to be really enthusiastic about my praise, bless him. If I saw a comic now do the kind of shit I was doing on stage back then, and then come up to me and tell me they thought I was great, I'd probably be super bummed. That's a lie, I'd just say thanks and try not to be too condescending, but point is the fact that Dave Williams treated me like any sort of an equal that night is incredible, so cheers to him. Go Comedy.

        Later that night I got kicked out of EC nightclub for embarrassing drunkenness after I tried to keep pace drinking with the bartender from Rhino Room who I thought was very pretty.
        Go Comedy.

Click here to read the next part - Day 27 - June 30th