After wowing audiences and critics with her impeccable comedic timing and relatable jokes at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival, Prue Blake is delighted to be on the road in WA as part of the Melbourne International Comedy Festival Roadshow.
The roadshow edition of the comedy festival, which is in its 25th year, sees some of the best and brightest stars of the festival bring their beloved comedy sets to the regions.
“This is my first time performing in regional WA,” Prue says while on the road. “I got to come over and do a couple of weeks for Fringe earlier this year, so I was excited to get to come back and see more of WA. We have a pretty wild schedule, but we’ve done Kalgoorlie, Esperance, Albany; we’ve been to Karratha and Port Hedland we’ve seen so much of WA and seen things we wouldn’t have probably gotten to see.”
Blake is performing excerpts from her hit show 'Unfriended' which she previously performed at Fringe World Festival.
“It’s about all of the friendships that I’ve had in my life and how I’ve kind of coped with them. I just think every song and film is about romantic break-ups and romantic relationships, but we don’t spend enough time to not only celebrate our friendships but also to kind of get over them when the friendship fizzles out towards the end, and so yeah, it’s also a bit of a f... you.”
While Blake has had her fair share of friendship break-ups in the past, she insists that no friendships with her current comedian friends are on the rocks. “I haven’t had any break-ups on this comedian tour group just yet,” she laughs. “But there are definitely some nights while on tour where I say 'I think I’m going to go to my hotel room and sit out on the dinner', but we have been really lucky with this group.”
“I’ve been in other groups where we’ve gotten into a little bit of 'unfriended' territory, but everyone’s pretty good. Surprisingly for comedians, this group is happy to have a bit of quiet time in the car and there’s not the need for constant roast battles.”
“It’s also been incredible working with David Quirk [on this tour], he was my director for Comedy Zone. . . So it’s been nice working together as colleagues rather than being directed and he’s been absolutely killing it every night, and Hannah Camilleri is so funny and does something that I could never do – sketch comedy. The acting is impeccable and it’s the most exciting thing to watch every night because you never know how it’s going to go.”
Visiting the smaller regional towns and performing to different crowds has been a career highlight for Blake. “They’ve been really lovely audiences. I’ve enjoyed every show and you never know how things are going to go, but they’ve all been really nice. Some audiences are drunker than others, some are not allowed to drink at all, and honestly I don’t know which one I like better.”
One town that was particularly memorable for Blake was Moora. “Moora was one of our smaller shows, but also probably more fun. The audience was great. It was in a town hall which isn’t necessarily most ideal for comedy, but it felt like everyone just wanted to have a good time.”
In addition to the onstage antics, one of Blake’s most memorable moments was visiting Twilight Beach in Esperance. “When we got there, we got to see two stingrays and then a pod of dolphins. I was like, 'WA is really turning it on'!”.
The state seems to have left such an impression that Blake teased it could be part of the inspiration behind her next show: “Maybe it will be about the sights and sounds of WA, or how I split with my whole tour group.”
The Melbourne International Comedy Festival Roadshow is on tour now. Prue is part of the Perth show, which plays Regal Theatre on 3 June. She's joined by Bob Franklin, Dane Baptiste, David Quirk, and Hannah Camilleri.
