Comedy Inc and Comedy Inc: The Late Shift
In 2002, I was approached to join a new sketch comedy show, this time for the Nine Network. I performed in a pilot episode for a production company called Screenhogs, but the chance to make the show was, in the end, given to Crackerjack Productions (now Fremantle Media Australia), and they asked myself and Emily Taheny to join their team. Two series of Comedy Inc were made for an 8.30pm timeslot, then, in 2005, came Comedy Inc: The Late Shift, a darker, edgier show for a 10.30pm slot.
Most of the cast did not know one another when we began shooting the first series in 2003, but we formed a tight, professional ensemble very quickly. Such is the nature of producing an hour of comedy a week, the work is hard and fast... and fun. The rough and tumble of sketch comedy saw us changing costume at the back of someone's parked car, getting make-up applied while seated on a fold-out chair in the middle of some lovely person's back yard.
For all its intensity, Comedy Inc was a finely tuned machine. Everyone had their part to play in developing material, pre- and post-production, direction and performance. The show used an average of forty writers, some full-time, many contributors. Prior to Comedy Inc, Crackerjack Productions had not produced a show of this magnitude for a commercial network.
As with Totally Full Frontal, Comedy Inc featured a range of generic characters and sketches as well as a number of parodies of film and TV shows and their personalities. I had garnered a modest reputation for celebrity impersonations after my TFF days. This time it was Michael Jackson, Tom Cruise, Eddie McGuire (notable personality on the Nine Network, Comedy Inc's home station). We had a go at Bert Newton, Jerry Springer, Australian Idol, Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, whatever was current.
Most of the cast did not know one another when we began shooting the first series in 2003, but we formed a tight, professional ensemble very quickly. Such is the nature of producing an hour of comedy a week, the work is hard and fast... and fun. The rough and tumble of sketch comedy saw us changing costume at the back of someone's parked car, getting make-up applied while seated on a fold-out chair in the middle of some lovely person's back yard.
For all its intensity, Comedy Inc was a finely tuned machine. Everyone had their part to play in developing material, pre- and post-production, direction and performance. The show used an average of forty writers, some full-time, many contributors. Prior to Comedy Inc, Crackerjack Productions had not produced a show of this magnitude for a commercial network.
As with Totally Full Frontal, Comedy Inc featured a range of generic characters and sketches as well as a number of parodies of film and TV shows and their personalities. I had garnered a modest reputation for celebrity impersonations after my TFF days. This time it was Michael Jackson, Tom Cruise, Eddie McGuire (notable personality on the Nine Network, Comedy Inc's home station). We had a go at Bert Newton, Jerry Springer, Australian Idol, Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, whatever was current.
We courted minor controversy by featuring Australian Olympic swimmer Ian Thorpe (Gabriel Andrews) as a candidate for a Queer Eye for the Straight Guy sketch. The Fab Five couldn't touch the image-conscious Aussie metrosexual.
Parody characters only last as long on our show as their celebrity makes them mockable in the real world. We shot quite a few Queer Eye For The Straight Guy sketches for series 2 of Comedy Inc and the first series of The Late Shift, but as Queer Eye slipped off the public's radar, so has our sketch, and I have had to shelve my Carson Kressley impersonation.
By the end of series 2 of Comedy Inc we were scared the show would sink without a trace. Little did we know that the network planned an expansion of the series, giving it a later timeslot and, therefore, more freedom to attack its comedic targets, as Comedy Inc: The Late Shift. Three more series were yet to be made.
Parody characters only last as long on our show as their celebrity makes them mockable in the real world. We shot quite a few Queer Eye For The Straight Guy sketches for series 2 of Comedy Inc and the first series of The Late Shift, but as Queer Eye slipped off the public's radar, so has our sketch, and I have had to shelve my Carson Kressley impersonation.
By the end of series 2 of Comedy Inc we were scared the show would sink without a trace. Little did we know that the network planned an expansion of the series, giving it a later timeslot and, therefore, more freedom to attack its comedic targets, as Comedy Inc: The Late Shift. Three more series were yet to be made.
Comedy Inc had been an incredible experience for me both professionally and personally (I met and married my wife, moved cities in the process). I built on my experiences inTotally Full Frontal and had truly fallen in love with sketch comedy. It was my natural habitat.
But after the second series of Comedy Inc screened all the people involved in the show felt the network had probably had enough. Not true, and at the end of 2004 production began on Comedy In: The Late Shift. As the name suggests it was made for a later timeslot, and allowed the producers more leeway in terms of material, language and creative freedom. We screened a couple of mini-sitcoms, including a series called Mathew & Brayden, and I got into political impersonations, with John Howard featuring, finally getting in some Kevin Rudd in series 5. The long-running Sunrise parody was a popular favourite.
Scott Brennan (of sketch show skitHOUSE) and Simon Mallory joined the show in 2005 (series 4 of Comedy Inc, series 2 of Comedy Inc: The Late Shift), while Ben Oxenbould and Gabriel Andrews left at the end of the first Late Shift series. Series 5 saw the addition of Rebecca de Unamuno (Big Bite), Fiona Harris (also of skitHOUSE fame) and Janis McGavin, replacing Genevieve Morris and Mandy McElhinney. Emily Taheny, Jim Russell and I were the only castmembers to remain with the show from start to end.
Included here are a few selections from the Comedy Inc years that I have put on youtube. There are plenty more sketches put on line by fans. It was a loved show.
But after the second series of Comedy Inc screened all the people involved in the show felt the network had probably had enough. Not true, and at the end of 2004 production began on Comedy In: The Late Shift. As the name suggests it was made for a later timeslot, and allowed the producers more leeway in terms of material, language and creative freedom. We screened a couple of mini-sitcoms, including a series called Mathew & Brayden, and I got into political impersonations, with John Howard featuring, finally getting in some Kevin Rudd in series 5. The long-running Sunrise parody was a popular favourite.
Scott Brennan (of sketch show skitHOUSE) and Simon Mallory joined the show in 2005 (series 4 of Comedy Inc, series 2 of Comedy Inc: The Late Shift), while Ben Oxenbould and Gabriel Andrews left at the end of the first Late Shift series. Series 5 saw the addition of Rebecca de Unamuno (Big Bite), Fiona Harris (also of skitHOUSE fame) and Janis McGavin, replacing Genevieve Morris and Mandy McElhinney. Emily Taheny, Jim Russell and I were the only castmembers to remain with the show from start to end.
Included here are a few selections from the Comedy Inc years that I have put on youtube. There are plenty more sketches put on line by fans. It was a loved show.
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