Wil Anderson – Wilegal Review (MICF 2018)
Summary: One of the more arresting (groan) shows at this year’s Melbourne International Comedy Festival, Wilegal shows that the time honoured comedic technique of drawing comedy out of situations that may ostensibly be no laughing matter is alive and well and is all the more engaging when anchored by one of the nation’s best loved media personalities.
4.0
Wil-fully Resisting Arrest
Wil Anderson, probably best known to the public as the host of ad takedown show The Gruen Transfer, found himself the subject of a highly publicised arrest in June of last year when a minor altercation on a plane led to an ignominious journey to the dark corners of the Wagga Wagga police station.
Rather than try to put this somewhat embarrassing incident behind him, Anderson has instead crafted an entire show around his incarceration and subsequent responses from the media and friends, making for just over an hour or material that mines a fairly limited subject for comedic gold and results in a live show that, while it may not be Anderson’s best work, shows that the comedian is just as comfortable with self-deprecating humour as he is at skewering the advertising industry.
Anderson’s laconic on-stage persona is affable and seasoned, with his honed spiel on the ignobility of being arrested garnering a rapturous response from the audience; the structure of the show itself is just as precisely formed, with Anderson deftly calling back upon earlier gags and spinning them into new punchlines as his material feeds into itself like some comedic Ouroboros.
The decision to focus primarily upon his arrest may make some question how Anderson could maintain the narrative over more than an hour but the comedian’s surprisingly frank admissions and introspections carry the show and, although some of the gags fall more on the “Dad Joke” side of the spectrum, Anderson’s rapier wit is evident throughout.
One of the more arresting (groan) shows at this year’s Melbourne International Comedy Festival, Wilegal shows that the time honoured comedic technique of drawing comedy out of situations that may ostensibly be no laughing matter is alive and well and is all the more engaging when anchored by one of the nation’s best loved media personalities.
Wilegal runs until April 22; tickets and show times are available here.
About the Author
Sean Warhurst Avid gamer. Cinephile. Considerate lover. Neither the word Protractor or Contractor accurately conveys my position on how I feel about Tractors.
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