This piece was published before the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak.
New Zealand improviser and comedian Guy Montgomery is back at his nonsensical, off-the-cuff best in his new show 'Well Well Well, If It Isn't The Man She Told You Not To Worry About'.
“It's a very silly show. It's advertised by the title and the accompanying poster,” Guy says.The new show is Guy's return to improvised stand-up comedy after experimenting with a more structured live format last year.
“I tried my hand at making a show with a purpose and a point last year, and I was pretty happy with how it turned out,” he says.
“I'm glad for the experience but I had a f...ing tough time getting through it. Previously, I'd done these really silly shows so it feels like I've earned the right to go back to these ridiculous roots.
“The sort of through line I've discovered is that nothing makes sense if you think about it long enough; all of the little moments that make up our day-to-day lives. . . When you put them under the microscope, it's all nonsense really. Every component part of life is just ludicrous.”
As if the prospect of making an audience laugh for an hour isn't daunting enough, Guy ups the ante by leaving his potential material in the hands of suggestions made by the audience. Needless to say, he sets himself quite the challenge.
“It's something where you have to accept total responsibility for what happens, so I don't mind it so much,” Guy says.
“I tried it out towards the end of last year as a means of generating new material because. . . Improvising stand-up is a slightly more challenging proposition. The first one I did was in Auckland and I had to adjust to the rhythm – as you can imagine there were some searing highs, some really sensational moments, and then we were really plumbing the depths with some of the lows.
“So adjusting to that oscillating momentum was a challenge but once you're comfortable, the audience is comfortable as well. You get the audience to write down a list of word or suggestions and I have them in a bowl or a hat and draw them out throughout the show and riff on the topics, because some of them will lead you down some pretty interesting pathways.”
Guy says the improvised stand-up shows are his way of building new material and prospecting premises for future shows.
“I've done four or five of these improvised hours now and they're really fun,” he says.
“Across the four to five hours, I've probably pulled four or five premises for shows, but they're really good premises that I really like.”
Having walked in both worlds of stand-up (improvised and structured), Guy is determined to sieve out of his act any jokes and bits that feel tiresome or forced when he's on stage.
“So, the big goal this year is to eliminate any of those jokes,” he says.
“It sounds obvious, but to get rid of any of that energy and replace it with the excitement of either improvising in the moment in the room or keep on doing these shows until I stumble into enough premises that I've got a whole hour I'm really proud of.”
Guy Montgomery was scheduled to play Melbourne, Sydney and Perth Comedy Festivals, all of which have been cancelled due to COVID-19.
