Lauded British purveyor of nonsense Elf Lyons is bringing her surreal comedy down under. The hook? It’s being performed entirely by a stuffed horse.
Dialling in from Adelaide, where her new show Horses is winning over audiences at the Fringe Festival, Elf Lyons provides a characteristically matter-of-fact response to why her new act is channelled through an inanimate toy horse.
“Why not?” she retorts without a beat. “I love playing with risk, and playing with ideas that traditionally make people go, ‘That seems ridiculous.’”
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Elf remains emboldened by a firm self-belief that performances should inherently derive from a sense of fun and spectacle. This is why she has been so gratified by the response of her Adelaide audiences, who, upon learning the show will be performed by a horse, react in a fundamentally childlike way.
She is quick to assure those who laugh awkwardly, unsure of what to expect, this is the concept and this is what’s happening.
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“I’ve made all types of standup shows and comedy shows and theatre shows,” she elaborates, “and I love a challenge. So when I get told you’ve gotta make something relatable, I’m like, well, what do you mean by ‘relatable’? I decided I wanted to do something that would make me happy and I made a show entirely performed by a horse.”
Elf’s current stint in Adelaide is not her first, having originally performed at the Fringe in 2015 and returning in 2018. It’s a place that holds special importance for her, both in terms of her career and development as an artist.
“Adelaide Fringe Festival, I would actually say, is the reason I went on to train to become a clown, funnily enough. I have a lot to thank to the Adelaide Fringe for opening me up to a lot of alternative Australian and American comedians I hadn’t heard of before.”
Making the long trip to Australia, she brings with her the perspective of audience responses in contrast to those here at the other end of the world. The best way she can describe Aussie audiences, when asked, is “eccentric.”
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She notes the extreme disparities in how her act is received between Adelaide, Melbourne and Sydney. “Each place is very, very different… Very vocal, or really just studying and watching what you’re doing,” she says, citing an experience in which an audience member shared that her show was unlike anything else they’d seen before.
“You sort of forget that people’s reactions to new and alternative art forms can totally vary.”
There is one major difference, she finds, between Australian and European audiences, being the internalised way that Aussies respond to a show. This has led to some perplexing encounters in which Elf once performed a set in Melbourne, to what felt like total silence in Melbourne, only for audience members to approach her after the show with ecstatic feedback.
“I’ve heard from other comedians, especially Australian comedians, that this is very normal. And then you come to Europe and you’re like, ‘Oh my god! The audiences here are so loud and so vocal.'”
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A great thrill for Elf is to peer out into the audience and be able to spot familiar faces – some, even, making repeat appearances.
“So far in Adelaide, I’ve had people coming to see the show not once, not twice, but three times and bringing new people each time. That’s meant the world to me.”
Observing Australia’s comedy output from Britain, she views the big rock down under as the birthplace of many brilliant, alternative comedy acts who come to the UK to blow audiences away with their unconventional standup. The reality, she has found, is very different on these comedians’ home turfs.
“When I came to Australia, it turns out the TV world, the industry, it’s not actually as hugely supportive… which explains why a lot of alternative Australian artists then relocate overseas, is my honest opinion. And it’s something that has been said to me multiple times.”
Elf Lyons is set to buck that trend, however, continuing a run of successful shows on her new tour Horses. Her desire to bemuse and delight audiences with her surrealist comedy remains unblighted, and something which surely has to be seen to be believed.
British standup Elf Lyons will be performing at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival across April. Buy your tickets here
