Yawp Mag ISSUE 19 Getting Ready for the Comedy Festival | Page 14

John Conway
in

'John Conway Tonight’
Barry Award-nominee John Conway is back at
the Melbourne International Comedy Festival
this year, with another season of his wacky tonight show, ‘John Conway Tonight’.

He particularly enjoys it when things go wrong,
“like when Graham Kennedy had that dog, he
was advertising Pal and the dog went to the toilet on stage. The crowd was going mental and he
was going mental. It’s a really good laugh. A reThis year, unlike previous seasons, Conway is ally unique laugh. I’ve done a lot of standup and
doing his tonight show without the aid of a side- you know when you’re having a good laugh and
kick, “I haven’t been me, because I’ve always you’re killing. You know when you’re going to hit,
had side-kicks. I’ve done a few solo standup everyone’s like ‘yeah! yeah!’ but when you’re
shows in the past two years, so I’m looking for- watching a show and you see that the host and
ward to seeing what happens.”
the guests have no idea what’s going on and it’s
so funny but they can’t control what’s going to
When asked whether this makes him nervous, happen next, it’s really cool!”
Conway replies that he’s looking forward to the
experience, “I’m very excited. I like being on
“I was just walking around my
my own, because there’s no one else to worry
about, it’s great. I don’t have to be like, ‘hey, be
house doing a character who
funny!’ to the side-kicks. Not that I ever had to,
was like, ‘did you fuck my girlthey were always very funny”.
He has been doing this tonight show format for a
number of years, because he says it is his favourite genre of comedy show. Conway loves the live
interaction with sketches, hosts and guests, “you
don’t know what’s going to happen”, he says, “it’s
not cabaret, it’s not clowning… it’s just… tonight
show. It’s more real, it’s not like, ‘hey we’re characters’. You don’t see it much anymore either”.

friend? Did you fuck Susan?’”

Conway doesn’t write scripts for his uproarious
shows, but admits it generally takes a few shows
to develop the jokes, “I’ll have proper ideas and
til I’ve performed it like two or three times”. As
an example, he describes the evolution of his
bit ‘Did you Fuck Susan?’ which is essentially a
segment where he pretends to be an American