Have you ever been cheated on? Perhaps you keep this painful experience a secret out of embarrassment or just because it hurts too much to talk about it. Matt Okine doesn’t think this should be the case. In The Other Guy,he’ll be opening up in front of thousands about the infidelity that tore apart his relationship of nine years.
“When that sort of thing happens to you, it makes you feel like you’re not good enough,” he explains. “So that’s why everyone keeps it hidden. There’s so much shame that comes with that situation that it makes you feel like you’re embarrassed. You’re embarrassed by the amount of trust you showed in someone.
“But I refuse to be ashamed of anything that happens in my life anymore. I’m just a person and I’m sure there’s millions going through the same things as me and I don’t see the point of keeping anything private. If more people shared stuff that was deemed ‘private’, then maybe you wouldn’t have young boys killing themselves and feeling inadequate.”
Some of Okine’s acquaintances question whether he is “oversharing”, but he dismisses this idea. Instead, he firmly believes that discussing these issues may assuage the suffering of others.
“People should know that this shit happens, and there’s ways to get over it. And I’m not just talking about relationship issues, I’m talking about status issues – status anxiety, which is not feeling good enough compared to your friends – and not feeling adequate enough about what you look like. I talk about all that sort of shit in the show this year, that if I’d seen a show like this before, I would definitely just realise that I wasn’t alone.
“I went through a terrible stage of status anxiety when I was 23 and I moved to Sydney, and I’m living on my sister’s couch, and I was like, ‘Where I am in this whole world? Do I live up to expectations?’ I was paranoid about how little money I was making. I felt inadequate. Money, jobs, to how many girls I’ve had sex with – I felt like, ‘Oh my god I haven’t had sex with enough girls, I’m not man enough’. It was so stupid. I was just a regular 23-year-old going through all that sort of stuff, so now I kind of feel like if I was the same 23-year-old watching the show, I’d realise that none of it matters.”
Okine was once a rising star in comedy. No longer. The dude has gone supernova, hosting triple j breakfast radio, supporting Dave Chappelle and selling out shows on a national tour (“It is nice to stop every now and then and enjoy the fresh smell of sourdough you can now afford,” he quips). Along with another of my favourite Australian comics, Damien Power, Okine possesses a deft ability to make you laugh while challenging your preconceived beliefs about complex, serious issues.
“All my shows have been about something important to me, and that’s why I do a show,” Okine says. “If I didn’t want to do that, I’d do comedy clubs and tell dick jokes and I’d be fine. My first show was about my mum dying, my second show was about dealing with money, my third show was half about getting arrested and ending up in a street fight, and this one’s about my relationship falling down. On paper, they all sound fucking terrible! They all sound like the basis of an episode of The Bold & The Beautiful!
“But the reality is there’s humour in everything, and it’s when you balance those serious moments with the light side that you make a good show. What makes a good show is not the jokes, but what you say in between them. I live by that rule. Don’t get me wrong, I’ll be talking about my relationship breaking down and things going to shit, but I’ve also got my killer bread material still.”
BY NICK TARAS
