Round of applause for comedian Dane Simpson everybody. . . He just got married!
A COVID wedding, Dane got married the day the new restrictions against dancing and singing came in, weddings excepted. “Everyone was partying a little extra hard I think! The last night on earth sort of deal, it was really fun!”
Bachelor life over, and tied down with a ball and chain into married life, the Wagga Wagga-based Dane’s new status might provide some fodder for his comedy material. “Yeah, maybe,” Dane chuckles wryly, “I think it’s a bit weird when especially blokes get up and do the whole Borat ‘my wife…!’ It’s so strange to me!”
Too early in the game to be divulging marital secrets on stage, at least in Dane’s forthcoming show, 'Didgeridoozy'. At the Adelaide Fringe, it’ll be the first time Dane is putting on the show “ready”, having performed a preview at last year’s Melbourne International Comedy Festival. “It was a one-off,” he says, “just me putting out the show I was looking at putting together, seeing what people’s response was and knowing I was going in the right direction.”
The iconic didgeridoo is the focal point of Dane’s new show, but what is it about the iconic instrument that he finds funny? That wry chuckle again, and Dane explains, “The whole show is really about me – I learned the didgeridoo as a kid, and me and my brother had a competition.
“My mum said, ‘I will pay the first person who learns how to circular breathe’. I think she knew that between me and my brother Kurt, we were so competitive, that we learn it, get in touch more with our culture via this sibling rivalry.”
Taking to the stage with a didgeridoo in hand, Dane will be regaling tales of that competitive streak in his family. “Growing up, with my dad, uncles and a couple of people in Narrandera just outside of Wagga where they teach people how to make didgeridoos – there’s all these stories.
“The whole idea is the didgeridoo is one aspect of Aboriginal culture and my growing up, but it’s just a puzzle piece of how my culture fits together and why it’s necessary.”
Worldwide, Dane agrees, people associate the didgeridoo with Australia and Australian Aboriginal culture, and with that image so heavily in the spotlight, there’s a revered and sacred responsibility that comes with demonstrating the instrument, but to tie it in with stand-up, there’s methods of cultivation Dane tries to take care of. “It can be a sensitive topic to some people,” Dane agrees. “Where I’m sitting with it is why is it a well-known instrument, why are people so attracted to it?
“What is it about the didgeridoo that people go ‘oh!’ and link that to Aboriginal culture? And linking it to Aboriginal culture is sort of like linking pizza to Europeans! 'Aboriginal' is such a vague term when you’re talking about countries and where you come from and language.
“It’s more personal stories for me – how I found out about the didgeridoo, how it sits in my family, and where I sit with it. And a few little reasons as to where and why you would play it, and some really silly stories about how I learnt to play the didge.
“Coming from country NSW and growing up embedded in Aboriginal culture and people [then], doing comedy is crazy for me, especially in major cities!”
Dane Simpson plays The Bally at Gluttony (Adelaide Fringe) 8-20 March.
