Beat’s got a soft spot for Sammy J. Pure immaturity doesn’t get much better than a show from the skinny guy and the rude purple puppet. Their MICF show, An Evening with Sammy J & Randy, promises more stupid tunes and silliness. The comedy duo are just finishing up filming their new TV series which has been three years in the making, and are looking forward to letting loose on stage in MICF. “We’ve written this whole new show,” says Sammy. “We’re back to our filthy smutty selves. It’s just us, with the keyboard segment and some silly songs, an hour of songs smut and shenanigans.” Good news. “There’s no narrative. There’s a bit of audience participation where we get in people’s faces, making people uncomfortable.”
The two play around with ideas in the same way you do when you’re stoned – what if Randy commits a crime and is arrested and allowed his one phone call, and rings Sammy and then realises he could keep his one phone call going on and on and on for several days. There’s a song called Whoa Nellie – that one’s about nicking a miniature pony from a kids’ petting zoo. There’s also one special New Year’s Eve song about making New Year’s resolutions that got a bit lost at the Opera House celebrations on actual New Year’s Eve. It will get an airing in this show even though it won’t be New Year’s Eve.
We don’t know about crowd surfing but Sammy J reckons there might be some jumping into the crowd on his part, if not Randy’s. “The set list has a certain order but the rest is loose-ish,” he says. “If an incident takes off with audience responses we’ll go with that, make it a priority. In Perth a few weeks ago a woman walked past the door during the show so we dragged her in and interviewed her on stage. We sang a song about her – it took a good 15 minutes.
Sammy details that he often gets a little jealous of his purple companion. “He gets to sit there the whole show. He rides on my coat tails. He has a delightful existence coasting on my comedy career. He’s got it pretty sweet.” He certainly has. Sammy J & Randy have collected a few awards over the years, including the MICF Barry Award in 2010, The Age Critics’ Award in MICF 2008 and they’ve been nominated for the Best Comedy Release ARIA in 2013.
Is there anything Sammy would like to explore beyond what he’s doing now? “I’d like to own a private jet. I have flown a plane once, I went on a joy flight and it was thrilling and exhilarating and fucking terrifying! I’ll never do it again. I don’t have the constitution. It’s fine when it was smooth but when it got windy…wind is your enemy. Most musical comics have written a few songs about flying, cos we spend so much time on planes. I’d like to write a book, a musical, a play. It depends how successful our show is, we’ll see if there’s any interest in us in the wider population, see if any more people want to get on the Stinky and Pinky train.”
Sammy J says that he and Randy (Heath McIvor) are ‘very much stuck together’. “We each do our own thing; he’s in Adelaide at the moment doing his own show, so that’s why it works so well cos we’ve always got other outlets. We’ll keep doing Sammy J & Randy for decades to come.”
BY LIZA DEZFOULI
