Speaker 1: Quest.
Speaker 2: Yeah, welcome friends to the Christian O'Connell show podcast.
Speaker 1: Been talking about uninvited animal visitors. Set a great email
Speaker 1: from Sam. Morning Sam, Christian. I was in the shower
Speaker 1: one day, instantly minding my own business, and a monster
Speaker 1: possum fell through the event in the shower from above
Speaker 1: me and into the shower and started going bizark, running
Speaker 1: around the shower trying to get out. I was screaming,
Speaker 1: that's a cool possum man to come back to him.
Speaker 1: Did you have to wait in the shower until the
Speaker 1: possum man? He feels so vulnerable naked in the shower.
Speaker 1: That is terrifying. It's worse then, Psycho Sam, thank you
Speaker 1: very much for your email. So the weekend a comedy,
Speaker 1: great pastaway. And that's Barry Humphries. I thought this morning
Speaker 1: somebody would have explained just about the huge, huge legend
Speaker 1: that Barry wasn't. The life he leaved is Steve Weissar.
Speaker 1: So Steve's on the line now, Good morning Steve.
Speaker 2: Good morning Christian. And what an appropriate, an appropriate anecdote
Speaker 2: that someone should have a possum in the shower.
Speaker 1: There's something Barry about though.
Speaker 2: There's so Barry Humphreys a possum in the shower. It's
Speaker 2: as an expression that they Nedda would have.
Speaker 1: It feels like the euphemism as well.
Speaker 2: Steve to me, the euphemism I'm going to problem in
Speaker 2: the shower for lucky you.
Speaker 1: So Steve tell us about the huge impact then or
Speaker 1: the great Barry Humphrees.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's where to start. I mean, we wake
Speaker 2: up today in a less funny world. He was a
Speaker 2: man who he was born in the thirties, so he
Speaker 2: was an old man. He was nearly ninety years old,
Speaker 2: but even as a student, he was creating mayhem at school.
Speaker 2: At university he became a datist, an artist whose entire
Speaker 2: career was focused on disrupting things. He organized an art
Speaker 2: exhibition at Uni of Dardur Art, and he got some
Speaker 2: old boots together and filled them with custard and called
Speaker 2: his exhibition Puss in Boots. His entire life was focused
Speaker 2: on disrupting people. Of those we all know those stunts
Speaker 2: that he did. I mean those stunts as a student
Speaker 2: where he were on his way on an early morning
Speaker 2: train to work, he had people bringing in He got
Speaker 2: on the first stop, and at every stop thereafter he'd
Speaker 2: organized people to bring on a different course of breakfast.
Speaker 2: So he was sitting on a crowded break train going
Speaker 2: into work with all these people hanging on, and at
Speaker 2: every station some of the first bring on the Coco pops,
Speaker 2: and at the next station they brought on some bacon
Speaker 2: and eggs, and the next one they brought in a
Speaker 2: cup of tea, and nothing was said. They got on
Speaker 2: took off the preceeding trade with. Another one he did
Speaker 2: in town was he got a sick bag and he
Speaker 2: filled it with vegetable canned vegetables, put it on the
Speaker 2: footpath just before peak hour, and then dressed up where
Speaker 2: it virtually a beggar clothes and proceeded to eat it
Speaker 2: all up with a spoon, and people peak, our commuters
Speaker 2: were gathering around in disbelief. It is horrible thing. I mean.
Speaker 2: Another time in London and for no reason he did this.
Speaker 2: He got on a train and pretended he was blind,
Speaker 2: and he was reading a pianola role, you know those
Speaker 2: perforated roles, and someone started beating him and said get
Speaker 2: out of the road to stupid old blind man. For
Speaker 2: no reason. He thought that was performance, asked, I mean
Speaker 2: he was doing this before he got onto a stage,
Speaker 2: and then he got onto a stage, and for seventy
Speaker 2: years he created these characters. Dame Edna, who charted the
Speaker 2: course of from a suburban Mooney Pond's housewife to becoming
Speaker 2: a superstar. I mean, she was the original blogger. She
Speaker 2: was a celebrity with no good reason before there were
Speaker 2: before there were bloggers. And maybe that was what he
Speaker 2: was commenting on. Les Patterson astral as cultural attache, just
Speaker 2: this slobbering, speeding, gufforing buffoon who was hilariously funny. And
Speaker 2: then you know, there was just a plethora of other characters.
Speaker 2: But you know, at his heart, mate he was I
Speaker 2: think he was a collector and he collected. Not only
Speaker 2: did collect books and things, he collected characters, but he
Speaker 2: also was responsible over seventy years for collecting great phrases.
Speaker 2: I mean, he was a blokeouo. Through his character Barry
Speaker 2: McKenzie collected all those phrases and brought them into the
Speaker 2: into common Parlance's phrase like you know, up at Sparrow's
Speaker 2: fat and up she'd creeked in a barbed white canoe
Speaker 2: without a paddle and she goes off like an alarm clock,
Speaker 2: or you know, he's got Buckley's or not with it,
Speaker 2: bulls roar or flashes a rat with a gold tooth,
Speaker 2: or flat out like a lizard drinking or more full
Speaker 2: in a Catholic school. I mean, these these were all
Speaker 2: the phrases that he just heard in pubs and on
Speaker 2: the street, and he incorporated them into his act. I mean,
Speaker 2: he was a giant. I mean, the best way of
Speaker 2: thinking about it is, we've just had the comedy Festival
Speaker 2: in Melbourne Christian and you know we're the best comedians
Speaker 2: in the world, and some might do a set of
Speaker 2: twenty minutes and the best might do a set of
Speaker 2: an hour. Barry Humphreys, even as a seventy year old man,
Speaker 2: was doing a three hour show himself alone on stage,
Speaker 2: all of his characters. He did dozens of those shows
Speaker 2: on three continents. A star in the US, a Star
Speaker 2: in the UK, Star in Australia, dozens of hundreds of
Speaker 2: TV specials, his own shows with the greatest stars in
Speaker 2: the world. But he would fulfill an available space all
Speaker 2: by himself. And you know, anyone who stood on a
Speaker 2: stage in dro and you know you do it every day,
Speaker 2: but you know the ad breaks he would stand on
Speaker 2: a stage by himself a three hours flat and entertain people.
Speaker 2: And it's not like singing songs where people can tune
Speaker 2: in and out or listen to that song and of
Speaker 2: the next. When you're doing comedy, you have to have
Speaker 2: people's attention every second. He would get a laugh for
Speaker 2: five laughs a minute, non stop for three hours. It's
Speaker 2: an unheard of feet and he did that in the sixties,
Speaker 2: the seventies, the eighties, the nineties. That he was even
Speaker 2: touring a one man show his own life all through
Speaker 2: the UK and Australia last year, right up to the
Speaker 2: moment of his demise. So you know, what, what a
Speaker 2: talent and you know he's going to be sorely missed.
Speaker 2: He wasn't just a great performer. He was a great writer.
Speaker 2: He was a great social observer and I think you know,
Speaker 2: these these are unique. He was kind of like a
Speaker 2: Mark Twain of Australia or an Oscar Wild of Australia.
Speaker 2: You know, a penetrating wit and a one off.
Speaker 1: What high praise as well, Steve, You've done You've done
Speaker 1: the great man justice. You're right, a colossal talent and
Speaker 1: like you, Steve, and I'm sure many people listening right now.
Speaker 1: Disappeared down a very pleasurable wormhole yesterday watching there's so
Speaker 1: many clips you're right, from the sixties and seventies with Parkinson,
Speaker 1: Joan Rivers and he's holding court. They were all his
Speaker 1: timing and his use of words and phrasing and look
Speaker 1: to cameras and to the audience, is.
Speaker 2: Y yeah or real?
Speaker 1: One off there? You never get another one like Barry.
Speaker 2: No, he's a one off mate. And you know if
Speaker 2: you say, what are we going to miss, We're going
Speaker 2: to miss a laughter. I mean, it is a rare
Speaker 2: thing to be able to make a stranger laugh. It's
Speaker 2: a unique gallup. And he could take a room full
Speaker 2: of strangers, an auditorium full of strangers and make them
Speaker 2: laugh and in the best way doing this one thing
Speaker 2: that is a very rare gift self recognition. He would
Speaker 2: turn the mirror on themselves and very few people can
Speaker 2: get a lot doing that. He was a genius. He's
Speaker 2: a genius or one of a one of a kind
Speaker 2: and he's going to be miss made.
Speaker 1: Oh you did him justice there, Steve. Thanks for talking
Speaker 1: to us this morning. I'll catch up with you soon, mate,
Speaker 1: But thank you Steve for doing that thanks.
Speaker 2: Chris at any time. The Christian O'Connell Show podcast