Mooney has a new show in store to mark the occasion. “Essentially it’s a stand-up show about the little lies I tell myself in order to get through – and there’s a lot of them,” Mooney explains of his new show. “I was watching The Hangover II with my wife and at the beginning, they’re again lying in a hotel room, wasted. I said, ‘Why do men do that, do you think? Why do they trash themselves so badly?’ Without even taking her eyes of the screen, she said, ‘Because they can’t deal with their reality and they’re stupid liars!’ I thought, ‘Yep, that’s the way that women look at us isn’t it?’”
Lawrence Mooney is a Stupid Liar is an intriguing title – after all, if there’s anything to be gleaned from his Mooney’s comedy, his countless podcast appearances, or even his Twitter feed, it’s that he’s a fairly forthright individual. One has to wonder if stray comments ever stir up trouble. “You never know how much something’s got you into trouble because people won’t tell you. They’ll act on that in a secretive way. It’s like being dumped: no one’s ever going to tell you exactly why,” Mooney explains. “They’ll say, ‘I just don’t want to be in a relationship right now’…they’re not going to say, ‘You know what? I hate your earlobes. They just drive me crazy.’”
“With that in mind, there’s two ways to go: not be yourself and also run the risk of offending someone or some other consequence, or be yourself and fuck what people think. I’m the latter,” Mooney declares. “They’re either with you or they’re not, so you may as well be yourself. You see people manipulating their image for what they think the media wants and it’s like, ‘Wow. You look like a fuckwit’. Insert long list of names here.”
It’s likely that, as the host of ABC2’s Dirty Laundry Live, Mooney could formulate a list about a mile long, the program exploring celebrity gossip. In discussing the show, Mooney reflects upon the lead-up to its debut episode. “I was probably more nervous than I’ve ever been, ever. My mind started to implode. I’d done a lot of live performance but live TV is something else.
“There was, to an extent, a lack of control. But that is also the upside: it’s incredibly exhilarating, your adrenaline is pumping, your heart is pounding in your eardrums…you’re travelling through time and space at an incredible rate and half-an-hour evaporates. It’s like hyper speed. It’s a lot of fun, it’s a quiz in the loosest way…it’s a wild ride.”
An accomplished host, Mooney will again MC Music, Mirth & Mayhem this year, a comedy festival favourite in support the Mirabel Foundation – an organisation that looks after children orphaned or abandoned due to parental drug abuse. “This year, we have Colin Hay (Men At Work), Vika and Linda Bull, Deborah Conway, Josh Earl, Dave Hughes and Dave O’Neil,” Mooney reveals. “It’s going to be a huge night. Each year it gets bigger and bigger. It’s one night only at the The Hi-Fi Bar and it’s for a great cause.”
BY NICK MASON
