With a beaming smile and wide eyes, Frankie McNair tells us she is a survivor of childhood sexual assault and sexual assault. She laughs as she calls herself a high achiever. In Huge Ass Mindset, McNair reframes resilience through an unflinchingly self-aware, fast-moving set that refuses to linger in victimhood. She leans into ambition, survival instincts, and the absurdity of how the world expects people to package trauma into something neat and palatable. There is bite in her delivery, but there is also a disarming openness that keeps the room with her, even as she pushes into darker territory.
Rather than using it as background context, McNair places this experience directly into the foundation of the work, challenging how sexual assault and trauma are spoken about, particularly in comedy. The hour builds as a series of escalating reflections, with ideas that recur and steadily gain weight as the set progresses.
For three years, Sweeney Preston worked at PEDESTRIAN.TV, Australia’s largest youth publisher, as a journalist, breaking stories like “There’s Been Yet Another Explosive Development In Brad Pitt & Angelina Jolie’s Family Saga” and “A Well-Known Aussie Gym Chain Has Finally Had It W/ Influencers, Banning Tripods At Its Gyms”. He also wrote dating advice articles, ironically while his own love life was in need of a rewrite. In Australia’s Worst Journalist, Preston blends his time in the newsroom with his mishaps in love for an hour of light-hearted comedy.
Preston’s delivery stays relaxed and aware throughout, which suits the material and keeps the tone grounded rather than overly stylised. His energy is consistently high, giving the set a sense of drive, even if the material doesn’t always match that momentum.
Natalia Sledz unleashes a chaotic, keenly observed feline world in Puss Puss, blending physical comedy, music, and surreal imagery into a largely silent hour of gleeful, unapologetic absurdity. It quickly establishes a distinct setup, inviting the audience to experience this reality through Puss Puss’ warped, instinct-driven lens.
At the centre of it all is Sledz’s skilfully measured performance. She captures feline behaviour with remarkable precision, from her fixation on noisy toys and anything that glints to her perfectly coughed up furballs and when an audience member sprays her with water. Every movement is intuitive, detailed, and finely tuned for maximum comedic impact.
Through centuries of daughterhood, the eldest daughter has been destined (or cursed?) for a life of perfectionism, high achievement, and anxiety. Rachel Tunaley is no different, as the eldest daughter of her family. However, when her sibling comes out as transgender, she believes she has been freed from the expectations that once defined her. Little does she know. In her new cabaret, Recovering Eldest Daughter, Tunaley takes the audience on a candid, humorous, and personal journey through mental health, identity, and the process of unlearning lifelong pressures as she searches for who she is beyond the role she was raised to fulfil.
Now the middle sister, Tunaley gleefully visits the Prophet of the Eldest Daughter to relinquish the eldest daughter label, only to be informed that too much time has passed and the title cannot simply be given away. No, there is only one way this can happen. She must learn to heal her inner child. Easier said than done. This prompts her to examine her past behaviours, thoughts, and relationships, confronting the patterns that have shaped her and the anxieties she has long carried.
Little Devil and the War Machine is set during the peak of political instability in Renaissance Italy, when Florence was frequently involved in conflicts and shifting alliances. This reimagining draws on the spirit of commedia dell’arte to explore the dynamics between four key figures, intellectual inventor Leonardo da Vinci, political strategist Niccolò Machiavelli, military ruler Cesare Borgia, and the mischievous apprentice Gian Giacomo Caprotti (Salai).
Rather than a straightforward historical retelling, the production reinterprets the era through a queer lens, questioning how identity and power are constructed. With mask work, bold physicality, and scenes of heightened comedy, it builds a vivid interplay of relationships where status, desire, and power are constantly negotiated onstage.
Christian Elderfield’s **Swingers** is a personal account that charts his experiences navigating the world of non-monogamy, framed under a mix of candid confession, saucy observational humour, and punchy one-liners.
Drawing on real-life encounters and a distinctly conversational style, he guides the audience through unfamiliar social spaces with curiosity and bravado, balancing explicit subject matter with a light, comedic touch.
Elderfield takes us through his adventures in swinging, and, in case it’s not obvious from the imagery, he’s referring to couples who have sex with other couples, not jazz music or playground equipment. He proves to be a strong storyteller, with a great sense of punchline delivery and a knack for puns.
In JKS: a Comedy(?), five comedians linger in a scrappy pub venue Green Room, killing time between sets by complaining about a tough crowd and taking cheap shots at each other. It’s loose, familiar territory, until the sudden death of a trailblazer in the Australian stand-up scene cracks something open. What begins as banter quickly spirals into a full-blown argument on the limits of comedy, the power of language, and who gets to decide what should, or shouldn’t, be a joke.
At the centre of this story are two opposing voices. Jase, a man of colour (Kevin Hofbauer), argues that nothing should be off-limits, that a joke on rape or paedophilia is not endorsing it. For him, comedy is about observation, not approval. On the other side is Alex, a gay, white man (Tom Ballard), who insists that comics have a responsibility to avoid punching down, and that intent does not cancel out impact.
Three eggs appear on stage. Slowly but surely, they begin to hatch, and out pop three cabaret-loving chicks. It’s best not to dwell on it too much. What follows is an hour of more chicken-themed burlesque, comedy and songs than you can fry. Adore Handel, Mae B. Wilde and Penelope Splendour are our hatchlings, who take us on a wild, ecstatic ride full of energy, cheek, and playful absurdity with Chookas.
The trio are adept at capturing the specific mannerisms of chickens. They display inquisitiveness and a judgmental edge as they reach out to the audience, almost as a challenge or assertion of authority. The way they move and feed off each other and us strongly resembles observing chickens, albeit with clearly exaggerated physicality.
When you buy a ticket to a show, you expect a complete performance. Not so with Abby Wambaugh. Instead, they offer the first three minutes of 17 different shows. What initially feels like a series of disconnected sketches is, in fact, carefully constructed, with Wambaugh deftly weaving together a narrative about family, love, loss, and grief in their debut show, aptly titled The First 3 Minutes of 17 Shows.
The 17 scenes shift constantly in tone and style. Some lean into borderline absurdity, others involve audience participation, and a few take on more traditional forms of stand-up or storytelling. One of the earliest segments sees Wambaugh embodying a vacuum cleaner, an unexpected bit that elicits plenty of laughs. Another, titled "Straight Stand-Up", has them sharing details about their husband and children: amusing, though it seems somewhat inconsequential.
Taylah Whelan is turning 26. Their mum was pregnant with them at 26, and Whelan is now having something of an existential crisis. Welcome to Happy Birthday Taylah Whelan.
Whelan is surprised to see us all in their house, though they did invite us over to celebrate their birthday, so it’s only natural we’d be there. They are slightly awkward and unsure of what to do, but when they realise the drink they have taken from a friend is called "The drink that makes you reminisce,” there is little left to resist. While they initially fight the urge, it proves futile, and before we, and they, know it, Whelan is on stage, reminiscing.
At 2024's Melbourne International Comedy Festival, people would not stop telling me to see Piotr Sikora’s clown show Furiozo: Man Looking For Trouble. Naturally, I missed it. I did eventually catch it later that year at Edinburgh Fringe, and from that point on, Sikora locked himself onto my must-see list. So when I learnt he was bringing a work-in-progress, Blizzard, to this year’s Melbourne Comedy Festival, I was properly excited.
We follow a Polish soldier on a strange, snow-covered journey. There’s a lot of snow. And an orange. And a creature of sorts. For the most part, the work is silent, with fragments of Polish and very little English. But Sikora’s ability to tell a clear, compelling narrative without relying on language is where the magic really sits, everything is communicated through physical comedy, audience play, and a constant (non-verbal) dialogue with the room.
If you’re expecting gay comedian James Barr to deliver a
steady stream of dick jokes in Sorry I Hurt Your Son (Said My Ex To My Mum), a
show built around the domestic abuse and trauma he experienced at the hands of
his partner, well… you’d be right. But what’s striking is how effortlessly that
humour is folded into the piece. The jokes don’t undercut the story, they sit
alongside it, disarming the audience just enough to let the harder beats land.
Barr begins lightly, walking us through his search for
Prince Charming, recounting a series of dates before arriving at the night he
met Chris at a Spice Girls concert. It’s framed as a turning point, the moment
he thought that two souls would become one.
Nosferatu, we’re told, is the German word for “sexy bachelor”, and that sets the mood perfectly for Nosferatu Looking For Love. Tired of his old life, this infamous vampire is chasing a sea change, heading to Australia with two clear ambitions, to become a star and to finally find a partner.
From the instant Rhiannon McCall appears, the character is fully realised. Dressed in black with stark white makeup, sunken eyes, exaggerated brows, a bald cap and pointed ears, the look is striking without being overdone. The hunched neck is a particularly nice touch, subtle but effective, adding to the physicality.
In 2008, Melbourne ended up in the global spotlight when 16-year-old Corey Worthington threw a house party that got wildly out of hand. His parents were away, and after posting an open invite on MySpace, over 500 people showed up to his suburban home. Total madness.
Now, he might want to keep an eye out, because two Nunawading locals are ready to make him old(er) news. In Best House Party Ever, best mates Big Mike and DJ JayJay, somewhere in their 30s and 40s, see an empty house as an opportunity. The moment DJ JayJay’s mum heads out, it’s game on. There’s booming music, questionable life choices, and the kind of party energy that escalates rapidly.
There’s nothing like a board game to bring out the best - or worst - in people. In Articulate, two share houses come together for their annual tradition: a fierce game night where the stakes are simple but brutal. The losing team must display a photo of the winners on their fridge - a daily reminder of their defeat and inability to guess even the simplest words.
In one corner we have the reigning champions: Tilly, Nadia and Jules: confident, composed, and fully expecting to take out the title once again. On the other are Lilo, Ben and Rommy, who are more than prepared. Warmed up and ready, they’re determined to prove they have what it takes to claim victory this year. The way each household is seen preparing for the evening is well directed and executed by the cast.
Hell hath no fury like a gay man scorned. What starts with sweet dates and musical theatre singalongs descends into something far more sinister. In The Ex Files: A Comedy True Crime Tour, Matt Bell blurs the line between true crime and total fabrication in his 'investigation', guiding audiences around the Melbourne CBD to uncover the evidence behind a crime that may or may not exist.
With each audience member armed with a pair of Bluetooth headphones, Bell guides us through a series of locations tied to the relationship at the centre of the story. We move from the bar where the first date occurred, to a cinema shaped by a wicked lie, to a restaurant that ends in heartbreak on the most romantic night of the year. Bell has clearly put thought into the structure, and standing at each location as he reminisces, makes the experience immersive, like we're re-living it ourselves.
Sugar Bits are back with their riotous sketch show, Feminist Trash, and they are ready to wreak hilarious havoc on Melbourne once more. Nicola Pohl, Tessa Luminati, and Stephanie Beza are the three brains behind the operation - so perfectly in sync it’s almost unfair to the rest of us. Unsurprisingly, when asked to do an interview, they answered as a single, terrifyingly witty entity.
Both the group name and the show title are boldly chosen, feeling playful, ironic, and a little provocative, teasing out how the group’s identity is reflected in - or upended by - these names. "It genuinely comes from very shallow beginnings: Sugar tits, but because we’re sketch comedy, we do Bits! Sugar Bits! Whereas Feminist Trash was born from a tagline when flyering for our first show, Hit n Hope, where we would say to people 'this show is feminist trash'," they tell me. "It just caught on and became an idea we wanted to make a show about. Feminist Trash subverts the name Sugar Bits because the name is ultra-femme, but the way Feminist Trash is grotesque, stupid, and dark, can be seen as unfeminine or ugly, which happens to be the way we like to be femme!"
Eldest Daughter Syndrome describes the pressure that often falls on the oldest daughter, who can end up taking on a lot of emotional and practical responsibility within the family. Recovering Eldest Daughter is Rachel Tunaley's new cabaret, sparked by the moment a surprise gender transition from her older sibling suddenly shifted her from eldest to… not so eldest.
Eldest Daughter Syndrome was something Tunaley had been acutely aware of for some time, and as with all great shows, “write about what you know” became the starting point, right up until her sibling’s transition changed the family dynamic. "I was seeing a lot of conversation online, especially on TikTok, about Eldest Daughter Syndrome and I resonated with the 'symptoms' for lack of a better word, and decided to unpack it more. While it’s not a formal syndrome, there are plenty of similarities in experiences for eldest daughters such as the burden to be perfect or successful whether that’s in career or romantically, struggling to articulate your own boundaries and needs with others and feeling like the caretaker of the family," she tells me.
Where can you swim with pigs on the beach? It’s one of the many questions Zachary Sheridan hurls into the void of the internet in Someday We’ll Find It. Over a tight 50 minutes, the work makes clever use of its time, playing with form and structure to probe our compulsive need to search for answers online. Some questions are absurd, some surprisingly profound, and others sit in the realm of the unanswerable, yet all speak to that endless, almost instinctive urge to keep typing, scrolling, and seeking.
Sheridan’s performance is notably restrained and grounded, a deliberate and necessary choice for a solo work built on such an unrelenting stream of text. Carrying long passages without pause, he allows rhythm and accumulation do the heavy lifting without over-performing. The stillness and control required to sustain that tone indicates a performer who understands exactly when to hold back. In doing so, he creates opportunities for the audience to project meaning onto the questions themselves, turning what could easily be repetitive into something absorbing, and at times, unexpectedly affecting.
Amelia Pawsey has spent years immersed in Melbourne’s
performing arts community, thriving in ensemble work and collaborating with a
range of directors and artists. Now, she’s stepping out on her own with her
first solo production, Love Letter to Heephah, a playful and poignant
blend of comedy and songwriting drawn from her experiences in a share house
where everyday moments of chaos, absurdity, and everything in between are revealed
with humour, honesty, and a bit of mischief.
"I absolutely cherish ensemble work, in particular, within the Melbourne
independent theatre scene. I have worked with many talented artists since
graduating drama school and have always felt inspired by the work of Aussie
creatives! I've had a lingering thought for years to give stand-up a go but
I've been too scared to back myself, making excuses why I wouldn't be good at
it," she explains. "Then this year I thought, that's not a valid
reason to not try something! It was in conversation with my housemates about
Heephah the random fox statue in our living room, where I realised I could
combine my passion of songwriting with stand-up, that Love Letter To Heephah
was born, and I could not be more excited to share this with MICF
audiences."
