David M. Green: Purveyor of fine humour

Tag: comedy

  • Week of Things

    Greetings all,

    It’s been a turbulent week for David M. Green (me). Let’s start with the good news… I won my raw comedy heat! I attended heat #3 at Adelaide’s “The Rhino Room” just one day shy of exactly one year since my appearance at Raw Comedy 2009. I was surprised with how well I was received by the packed room. I guess you go over the routine in your head so many times beforehand that it loses all meaning and you can’t remember why you thought it was funny. Here’s a still of me in action:

    Of the 9 stand-up appearances I’ve made so far, I do believe Thursday night was my best. I think I’ve “found myself.” I compared this year’s video with last year’s and I suddenly had a new perspective. I immediately thought of my 2009 appearance: “Wow… I was really awkward, and not that funny.” I was doing a more bumbling version of myself, whereas this year I was just me and I took a more personal approach with my material (and not in a disgusting way) that I think set me apart from the other comedians. So anyway, I was declared one of the two winners for the evening, which means I’ve made it through to the semi-finals. Slight complication, I’m moving to Melbourne in 2 weeks and the South Australian Raw Comedy semi-finals are in 3 weeks, and in Adelaide (obviously), so I guess I’ll have to come back for the day. If my next appearance goes as well as the heat, it’ll certainly be worth it. Of course, that’s never a given…

    Like all my stand-up appearances, this one was recorded in video form. However, as I have to do the same routine at the semi-finals, I’ll hold off uploading it to YouTube (to avoid further joke spoilage). Stay tuned for more details…

    In other news, less success on the “living close to the Melbourne CBD” quest, but that’s okay, because I’m actually really looking forward to spending more time with two former Adelaidean friends of friends (who, at a personal request, wish to remain nameless) in their fine Altona abode. Along with the reduced rent comes a quiet suburban house with good (albeit anonymous) company. It will be similar to the Adelaide set-up I’ve got now, living in Seacliff and working in the city. Living in Altona and working/studying in the Melbourne CBD won’t be too difficult to adjust to, as these maps illustrate…

    Interestingly, both suburbs are about 14km from their respective central business districts. However, I couldn’t take that exact route seeing as though helicopters are unaffordable at this stage in my entertainment career. From my house in Seacliff to the single Adelaide Railway Station it’s about 20-25 minutes on an express train (40 minutes stopping all stations). To catch the train from Altona to the underground Melbourne Central Station, right across the street from RMIT, it’s 25 minutes stopping all stations! Electrification is certainly the way to go. Of course, if you’re a motorist, Adelaide does have its advantages; abundant cheap parking, no toll roads and an easy-to-navigate grid system that puts Melbourne’s suburban layout to shame. It’s only 20 minutes to drive from my house to Adelaide. As a thrifty individual at the best of times, I certainly couldn’t see myself taking the tolled West Gate Freeway/Citylink when I’m a poor student again. I’m planning on selling my car anyway and relying purely on trains and trams. Don’t much care for buses though. However, on a side note I was shocked to discover that as a post-graduate student I’m NOT entitled to a student concession fare! Even though I’m a full fee-paying ($12,000), full-time student I still have to pay full price for train tickets. That’s ridiculous. I shall be joining the next protest meeting… assuming it’s not to expensive to get there.

    In Palace Nova cinema news, I found out yesterday that I won a little staff competition they were running. I had the highest average candy bar sale over the December/January period, entitling me to a $300 Myer voucher! This’ll certainly come in handy for buying furniture (possibly a bed) in Melbourne. It makes a nice going away present, actually. I handed in my letter of resignation a few days ago. It was sad. I’d never actually written a resignation letter before. I seem to have a history of ending employment through just having my shifts stop (Kmart), the store closing down (GameTraders) or being replaced with a computer (SAFM). This was the first great job I actually had to leave under my own accord.

    But now for some sadder news. After a little over 2 years, Jemima and I decided to end our relationship on Friday. This had been a long time coming, as I’ve been planning on moving to Melbourne for many months and we had already decided we didn’t want to “settle down” together. It’s been a fantastic 2 years and I’m certainly a much richer person for having known her. I’d be happy to write her a letter of recommendation.

    Understandably this week has been quite stressful for me. From my whirlwind visit to Melbourne, to the nerves of preparing for the Raw Comedy stand-up, breaking up with Jemima and quitting my fabulous cinema job. I’ve done a lot of walking and not had much of an appetite so I’ve lost a bit of weight. I’m actually feeling rather sick right now with a sore throat and that “stuffed-up” feeling. This used to happen to me after my first university exams. Your immune system fights it off until the hard work is finally finished, then you get ill.

    Actually, I kinda like it when I’m nervous and stressed-out because that means I’m breaking new ground and challenging myself. It’s a good thing.

    Kind regards,
    David M. Green
    One stand-up guy.

  • Comedy for the Working Man

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-kLYToFDTkI&feature=player_profilepage

    Hey Hey!

    I did a spot of stand-up again last night. Thought I’d talk about my job at the cinema a little this time, so I did… I hope it doesn’t lead to my firing, like the last time I did workplace-related humour… Triple J’s Dave Callan did a great job hosting the evening. I actually thought I was on 3rd, but someone didn’t show up so I was surprised when my name was announced. Smiddy didn’t have the camera ready, as it was still in my bag, so the first 15 seconds or so wasn’t recorded (but those opening jokes fell flat anyway!). It was a very casual, laid-back evening of entertainment. Please enjoy.

    Oh yes, while I’m here, I watched John Safran’s Race Relations on ABC TV this week. Hilarious! By far the best Australian show I’ve seen all year. Wasn’t impressed much with the show on before it “Hungry Beast” (which I actually auditioned for under the show’s previous title of “Project Next”). It seemed like a bunch of journalism students trying to be the next “Chaser,” but very wooden and bland and not particularly funny. And I’m not just saying that because I was looked over for a hosting gig… stupid stuffed shirts wouldn’t let me on their crappy show for jerks… Na, they’re okay.

    Kind regards,
    David M. Green
    Several projects in the pipeline

  • God-like Status Achieved at TraxxRADIO

    Yo blog-fans!

    To my utter surprise (and partial disgust) Brisbane-based Internet radio station TraxxRADIO actually wants to re-broadcast the somewhat funny (at times) AM-style talk-back parody show we did back in summer… On The Yacht.

    As soon as Program Director Ruby Tuesday declared his interest, I immediately triple checked we were talking about the same show. In fact we were. It’s not that I think On The Yacht wasn’t funny. Quite the opposite. At its best it’s hilarious. But I think we did such a good parody at times that you could be listening for several minutes before you worked out it’s not a real talk show, and even then you still can’t be sure. For TraxxRADIO’s unwavering dedication (not to be confused with their desperation for programming), I sent them an autographed David M. Green head shot, which they promptly framed and hung on the studio wall. My judgemental expression and sensible hair-cut forever gazing down at and distracting whoever’s on air. Obviously I use the term “head shot” in the G-rated sense. Although the sensible hair-cut extends to all areas of David M. Green.

    So once again join Radio’s Adam, Norman Vine, Dr Kevin Goodall and Tim Wray (in the news room) as they potter on about all things irrelevant Wednesdays and Fridays 7am and 7pm AEST (GMT+10) online at TraxxRADIO.

    On The Yacht: Not commercial. Professional.

    Kind regards,
    David M. Green
    Oh ho ho ho yessssss…

  • THE Big Show on Triple M: Reflection

    Greetings,

    Well last night I made my commercial and national radio debut with THE Big Show on the fabulous Triple M network. Due to delays, it went to air almost simultaneously in Adelaide and Sydney around 10:45EST (10:15CST). Melbourne didn’t start until after midnight. Not sure about Brisbane. Anyone hear it in Brisbane? If you missed it, the podcast is now up on the Triple M websites, the Semi-Pro Radio website, and the mp3 is right here.

    So that’s it. We did the show and now it’s over. Special thanks to Triple M, to whoever came up with this Semi-Pro Radio idea, to Alan Miller Fast Voice-overs (the agency we represented), to Miles and Sam “on the pots and pans” and their fabulous recording and editing work and to Tim Lordan, APD at Triple M Adelaide for tolerating us. Overall we’re all pretty happy with the show. For a once-off pre-recorded show recorded and produced with the limited time and resources available to us, it’s pretty good. Good. Not great, in my opinion. Although what do you expect? It was only by the end of the recording session we were getting into it. I hadn’t done radio with Matty B in over 2 years and we’re used to sitting in chairs around a panel, not standing “Nova-style” in a 4 metre squared voice-over booth. Funnily enough, we initially wrote in the show’s description “with David M. Green and Matty B in the hot seat, or seats, depending on budget restraints…” Ironically there were no seats.

    I think it’ll be obvious to anyone listening with a basic understanding of radio that some of the talk breaks were quite edited. 2 whole talk breaks weren’t recorded simply because we ran out of studio time. Another sketch we recorded wasn’t edited because we ran out of production time, and other things that were recorded, edited and ready to go were then cut due to their content and further time concerns. I can now personally appreciate why Tony Martin demanded 7 production hours for every 1 hour of “Get This.” For a comedy show, you need a lot of time, even if just to listen back and redo little things (which we didn’t really have a chance to do, although hindsight is 20/20 and with a pre-recorded show there’s always the temptation to go back and “fix” EVERYTHING. In a way it’s easier to do it live…).

    Most disappointing for me personally was the loss of an entire minute from the Smiddy soundboard prank call. I feel like a bit of a jerk now, as on the show I introduced it as “the greatest prank call in the history of the world,” a wild and totally unjustified claim I know. The original was 4 and a half minutes and that version was legitimately too long and dragged a little, so I cut it down to 3 minutes. The 3-minute version is very funny. Certainly a lot funnier than the 2-minute version that went to air. But thanks to the miracle of the Internet, you can hear the 3-minute Smiddy soundboard prank call right here. Hazaa!

    I guess a big problem for THE Big Show was the fact that we simply had too many ideas. We really packed the maximum amount we thought we could get away with into each 3-minute talk break (evidently more than the maximum as it turned out). If we were doing 5 shows a week we’d probably spread the ideas we had over a whole month. We didn’t leave ourselves any time to potter along with some laid-back banter. We didn’t want to take the risk and waste a talk break. We only have 1 show, only the BEST. The end result is a very fast-paced show (probably too fast, even for Alan Miller’s Fast Voice-overs!). I felt we needed a little more time to introduce and explain and just chat. We could have spent another whole talk break doing impressions of those clips from The Lawnmower Man. I love the quotes “His mind is like a clean hungry sponge!” and “You gonna do some, uh night-mowing?” They’re hilarious! We should have made a bigger deal about those, instead of brushing over them so quickly. Not to mention the incredible coincidence that Pierce Brosnan’s character in that film is named “Larry” and we mashed it together with clips from Channel 7’s “Larry The Lawnmower.” Can you believe that? I couldn’t believe it when I noticed that, AFTER I’d already started writing the sketch.

    But all in all a truly incredible, amazing, RARE priviledge. We made a comedy show for Triple M! And there’s plenty more where that came from. We’ll be back on-air somewhere in some form eventually. No doubt about that.

    Kind regards,
    David M. Green
    Mind like a clean hungry sponge.

  • THE Big Show: It’s Freaking Hilarious!

    Hey!

    I went into Triple M Adelaide yesterday to sit in with Sam (our extremely dedicated producer) while he put the finishing touches on all our sketches and segments for THE Big Show. Poor Sam. He’d just got back from his European holiday the day before (no doubt to escape the huge workload thrust upon him by the Triple M production department) and he had been at Triple M catching up on the backlog of work since 5am! I got there at noon and I was supposed to spend an hour with him going over the show. I ended up staying for 3 and a half hours. Laughter was abundant.

    I gotta say, it sounds fantastic! Kudos to Sam and Miles in production and Tim Lordan, the assistant programme director for their time and advice and excellent work in bringing our ideas to life. Until now, we were all thinking “well, we’ll give it our best shot and hopefully it’ll be good” but now that I’ve heard how it all sounds it’s “Oh my God! It worked! It’s great! This is amazing!” But hey, I don’t want to over-sell it… You can decide for yourself. Tune in this Sunday August 30th 2009 at 10pm on Triple M in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide or online. It’s Semi-Pro Radio. This week it’s  THE Big Show with David M. Green, Matty B, Tim Wray, Nick Godfrey & Adam Navarro and I can honestly say it’s some of our finest and funniest work to date. And we had a damn good time doing it!

    Kind regards,
    David M. Green
    Look out for the Larry the Lawnmower sketch…