You may have seen the Fred Negro posters stuck up around Melbourne’s CBD or the advertisements in the street press for one of the new kids on the Melbourne comedy circuit. This publicity intrigued me, so I decided to check out the comedy at The Urban Bar.
Located on the ground floor of the Urban Central accommodation building, the bar is accessed by walking through the foyer, past the internet room, into the communal kitchen and through the doors in the dining area. The bar itself is a quite large beige box of a room, but a low ceiling, warm lighting and a mixture of comfy furniture give it a cosy feel. There are a few large pylons running down the middle of the space, but given the size of the room, it’s easy to find a spot that gives you a direct line of sight with the stage. To top things off, it’s smoke free!
A rather young crowd sat themselves down on the various couches, stools, funky furry swivel chairs (which CJ Fortuna referred to as giant Ugg Boots) and even the floor. They seemed to be predominantly students and backpackers who were staying at Urban. Even with this abundance of youth, I still wasn’t the oldest person in the venue. That honour belonged to the token old drunk guy by the name of Garry who sat front and center and vocally brought attention to himself all evening. Apart from a few people who were playing pool at the back of the room, everyone else was very well behaved and were hanging on every word that came from the stage. It seemed that the people were there for a cruisy night of comedy and were quite reserved. This unfortunately meant that if a performer wanted to do a bit of audience participation, they REALLY had to work for it.
The bar has a happy hour before the comedy begins so that punters can get suitably lubricated for laughing, but with the quality line ups on offer, drunkenness isn’t a prerequisite for enjoyment. One time performer and now promoter, Marty Lappan puts together this night and has lined up many of the big names from the local scene. Pommy Johnson, Greg Fleet and Chris Bennett are among the many who have graced Urban’s stage in it’s first few months. The night is organised in the traditional 2 brackets of entertainment with the first comprising of three 10 to 15 minute sets. After a short interval the headline act performs for about an hour. It all wraps up before 10:30 so everyone can get in some beauty sleep before a busy Monday morning of work / school / creative Dole Diary writing.
Urban Comedy is a great way to finish your weekend. An evening of laughing in a relaxed bar certainly gets you ready to face another week.
Urban Central is located at 334 City Road, Southbank. The show takes place on Sunday at 8 pm and entry is free