A bumper crowd rolled up to see Arj Barker on a Saturday night at St Kilda’s Palais Theatre. His ability to consistently draw the biggest crowds of the Comedy Festival is no mean feat. The show started bang on time which meant due to the venue’s thoroughly inefficient ticket scanning method, many people were still finding their seats during the start of the show.
Unusually for a comedy festival show, there was a support act. However Joel Ozborn was worth getting in the doors on time for. He’s toured with Barker many times before, but it was clear that the Eric Bana doppelganger was standing in front of many people who hadn’t seem him before. Most weren’t expecting a support; the running times on the door didn’t mention one. Ozborn started off getting modest laughs but they steadily grew during an impressive and decent length set that certainly garnered him some new fans.
Arj Barker appeared on stage immediately after to a big rousing reception. He got straight into his performance and had everyone laughing from the get go. It’s really amazing how comfortable he is onstage. He’s been at it for 25 years, yet it’s still astounding to see just how natural he is in front of a really big venue for a stand-up.
This year Arj’s show was called Organic, which is a surprisingly great topic for comedy. Often times when people tell you about something being organic it’s met with rolled eyes or scorn. Arj played on this throughout the performance to great effect. His girlfriend of a couple of years switched to buying organic fruit and veggies where possible and he waxed lyrical about how quickly they go off and how ugly they are. However the real gold began when he spoke about switching to gluten free seven weeks earlier. He claimed that he hasn’t noticed anything different, he just misses happiness, and it turns out gluten is happiness, and it’s in just about everything.
He spoke quite a bit about the fact it was well known he was a bachelor and how his life had changed now he has a serious girlfriend. He cleverly detailed what moving in with her was like and how he now understands how someone could murder another human. Explaining how he got permission to use that joke from said girlfriend was particularly humorous.
It was his tenth time at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival, so Arj has been involved in a third of the years it has been going for, which is a pretty fair effort for a foreigner, even if he does spend half his time here these days. He’s reached a level of success and recognition 99.9% of comedians never achieve, so it’s particularly impressive to see him work on and hone his craft and bring such a brilliant show to our shores this year.
BY ALEX CROWDEN
