Ethnic Comedy
With the completion of the USA’s comedy duo Allah Made Me Funny recent Australian tour, Lou Pardi thought the time was right to speak with the duo, Preacher Moss and Azhar Usman along with some of our own Australian comedians about ‘ethnic comedy’.
The first question I stumbled across in preparing this piece was ‘what is an ethnic comedian’? Simon Palomares. George Kapiniaris. Partners in crime for over 20 years, from Wogs out of Work to Acropolis Now, two of Australia’s hottest ethnic comedians right? Well, yes, and no.
Simon and George started performing after studying together and immediately realised they were onto something. Ethnic comedy wasn’t an aim though, rather a label given to what, for them, came naturally. I asked Simon if he considers himself an ‘ethnic comic’. “No, and in a sense I never set out to be. I just started doing what everybody at the time was doing, talking about my homelife. I grew up in Lygon street, Melbourne. I assumed everybody lived in a neighbourhood like mine. It wasn’t until George and I got our first review that said ‘Migrant Humour arrives at last’, that we said ‘Migrant humour? Is that what we are doing?’”
George recounts a similar story “We don’t want to be ethnic comics, we just want to be comics that talk about ourselves. It just happens that our experiences are from a wog point of view, rather than an Anglo or a skip point of view. Wendy Harmer and Richard Stubbs then were talking about the great Aussie BBQ. Well we were talking about the woggy Christmas or the woggy christening or the woggy wedding – but you know it was put into that little stable of wog humour.”
Tanya Losanno agrees “I don’t consider myself an ethnic comic. The reality is that comedians more often than not talk about their background and my parents just happen to be Italian. I think my comedy has been successful because anyone from any background can relate to the subject of a crazy family.”
From an African American point of view, Preach says “the idea of an ethnic comic, particularly in the United states has been shaped by historical perspective in the United States, in the context of where you were able to perform, where you were able to dance, where you were able to sing.”
Azhar says “Something that I like to take tremendous pride in is the history of ethnic comedy in America; basically, the history of stand up, is the history of protest. I feel that it’s an art of protest. And the greatest comics, for me anyway, have always been the ones that made you laugh and made you think. Certainly Preacher Moss, just because he’s a Muslim comic, doesn’t make him any less of a black comic. And whatever that means, for that matter, being a black comic doesn’t you any less of a comic. Period.”
Relative newcomer, Brisbane comic Nishan Selvadurai (Nish) says despite preferences, it’s not always the comedian’s choice. “At this early stage of my career I am not sure that I do enough ethnic material to consider myself an ‘ethnic comic’, however, the audience decides as soon as you step out on stage.”
Another relative newcomer, Kieran Yap has already changed his view on whether he’d consider himself an ‘ethnic comic’. “I kinda denied being an ethnic comic at first but then sorta figured that if everybody else was gonna consider me as one then why fight it, its not like its inaccurate anyway. However, that doesn’t mean that I restrict myself to just jokes about race. I write about who I am and I am a lot more than just Chinese/Scottish.”
Nish recalls a positive encounter. “A fellow Sri Lankan Australian came up to me after a performance and said ‘I didn’t know that one of our people could be talented like that’ – which was a really nice thing to say but it also implies that ‘our people’ are somewhat retarded. I chose to take it as a compliment.” He sees comedy as his opportunity to be seen. “It’s about being represented in the mainstream. Not all Australians are blonde haired and blue eyed. You wont see me on Neighbours unless they build a 7 Eleven on Ramsay Street.”
George finds this prevalent in finding acting roles. “You’re cast in roles that are stereotypically kind of wog roles. You want to play anything, like other actors you want to be put up for any roles. But because we are in this body, in this country, in this situation and you know, not from where our parents come from and stuff, we’re stuck in this limbo land of we’re not from there and we’re not from here, we’re kinda like, out of the inner circle.”
I mention to George that one of Australia’s most successful personalities is Vince Sorrenti. George says “The good thing about Vince is he actually does do a lot of mainstream stuff, he can do a whole show without actually doing something Italian, or from Punchbowl or anything like that. That’s what I’m trying to do now, trying to kind of drop the kind of Greek stuff, and the wog stuff and trying to go a bit more mainstream with my material, because I have to, to compete with the rest I have to do that.”
Simon also sees a lack of representation in media. “As people, not necessarily just ethnic, we need to see ourselves reflected in the broad media in positive and natural ways to get a sense of ourselves in the bigger world. Television is even worse now than it was when we were doing Acropolis in so far as a homogenised look is concerned. And as for commercial radio, don’t even get me started, if it was any other industry there would be an inquiry.”
Azhar talks about Bill Cosby’s role as a representation of African Americans, “one of the things Bill Cosby has caught a lot of flack from the black community for is why doesn’t he talk more about race either in his act or in his show. The beauty of being a comic genius is you can talk about a topic without even saying a word about it. The sitcom The Cosby Show, that’s the first time in American television history where you have middle class black America. You know a husband, a wife, a lawyer and a doctor, unheard of in Hollywood, absolutely unheard of. And what I recently heard, which again absolutely blew my mind, was that every single script of the Cosby show was reviewed by the country’s leading black American psychologist. He would review the script because television has a psychological impact, an effect, on its viewers. And it’s been also proven essentially now, through social scientific research that groups that are represented on television place a tremendous amount of stock in how they’re being represented on television. Because you do believe that it’s you being represented. I would argue that a lot of the negative images of Muslims on television today, particularly in the news media, is directly connected to and fuelling the rage, and the outrage. The more images you show these people of Muslim terrorists who look a certain way who act a certain way who espouse a certain rhetoric and a certain ideology, the more of this you’re going to create in society. And if you want to curb that, you’ve got to present other images. The answer? The answer is an Arab Bill Cosby. A Muslim Cosby. Wouldn’t that be great – I mean can we imagine a world where there was a hit American sitcom that portrays such a character? Well maybe that world is around the corner, hopefully.”
Whilst there are roles specifically designed for ethnic comedians, even these aren’t necessarily safe. Tanya had an interesting experience. “I was asked to do gigs with some Italian/Australian comics and it turned out that they thought I wasn’t Italian enough so they fired me. That to me was a sign of how narrow-minded people can be and that it doesn’t just happen in one form. It swings both ways. At first I was genuinely shocked that I could be fired for being in effect ‘too Australian’ but it worked out for me because it made me realise the type of comic I want to be and I know I will never compromise who I am, not even in comedy.”
Preach has also had a surprising experience when being booked for a Muslim event. “Someone from a certain organisation saw me do a show early on, they wanted me to come and do their event. My Mum calls the guy that’s organising it, because I was running around. He said ‘oh no, we can’t have him because he’s racist.’ The crazy part is I was labelled as a racist. Here’s the funny part, we’re doing their convention in Chicago, they love us. And I did the same joke.”
It’s not unusual for satire to cause offence if people misinterpret it. Sometimes it takes comedy-savvy audience to understand it. Preach says, “That was the point, oddly enough, I really felt like mainstream was more ready for Allah Made Me Funny than the Muslim community.”
Azhar comments, “Muslims just need to be educated about its importance. And the fact also that, we are doing jokes of course that are hopefully thought provoking, i.e. provocative, but they are always respectful and they are always tasteful. People make an assumption about the show, because they’re programmed to think of standup as necessarily blue, or sexual, or using foul language. They just assume that that’s the show. Or even if they give us the benefit of the doubt that we won’t curse, they think that we’re making fun of Islam, or that we’re making fun of Muslims.”
For all the challenges, there are plenty of rewarding memories. Simon says “with Wogs Out of Work, which is now ancient history, 20 years ago, I was very lucky to be part of a show that hit such a chord at a time that the ethnic population was ready to laugh at itself. The feeling in the theatre in those early years of Wogs was like nothing I had experienced before or since. There was a kind of emancipation of the audience in the sense that up until that point they thought that they were the only people to behave like that at home, then coming to a theatre and be laughing with a thousand other people at the same-same.”
George recalls “a guy called up the Enmore theatre when we were doing Wogs Out of Work, and he said ‘I’m coming to the show tonight, what time’s the screening?’. He’d never been to the theatre before; he thought it was like a film. A lot of people, they’d never been to the theatre, all they did was watch TV and DVDs and films, so it brought a whole audience of non-theatre goers to the theatre.”
Simon and George’s comedy not only hit a chord with the ethnic community, but caught the attention of many others. Simon says “the Australian dictionary included the word ‘Wog’ as a term of endearment after Wogs Out of Work. They also included the word ‘SKIP’ after Acropolis Now.”
George says “people are always coming up to us and saying, ‘good on you, good on you for making it easier for me to go to school, for making it cool to be a wog.” He’s quick to point out though that although it’s rewarding, it wasn’t intentional. “That’s other people talking to us – we don’t say that this is what we did, because we did all of this by accident.”
Kieran has had his own affirming moments, “I once had a guy who was in the bar before the show, a bit of a bigot who didn’t know I was a comic, kinda assumed I didn’t speak English, talked slowly and made stupid remarks, he was making racial remarks and I ignored it and went back stage. After my set which I focussed more on race than I usually do, he came and apologised and bought me a drink. I don’t like to read too much into it because he would have probably been rude and stupid to me still if I had a bad set, but it felt good anyway.”
Simon confirms the importance of doing the job you’ve come to do “I’ve done stand up from Thomastown to Cronulla and people relate to different things, but in the end the challenge is to be funny and entertaining. Say whatever you need to say but be concise and have a good punchline.”
Preach shares this bottom line. People don’t always expect them to be funny, as he puts it, “Muslim and comedian is like a crack head with a savings account”. However, Allah Made Me Funny have performed at The Improv, the biggest comedy nightclub chain in the US, renowned for only booking high quality acts. I ask Preach how this came about. “Basically I’ve been dealing with them for the last 15 years as a comedian and a Muslim… the biggest part is when we showed up, we weren’t some kind of novelty, we weren’t getting pity laughs. People weren’t like oh, at least they did something, I’m gonna laugh. I don’t have that luxury, and I emphasised that wasn’t going to be a luxury on our tour. Out of everything that we did, the concepts, the mission of the tour and the goals, the focus of building bridges, in the end is you better be funny.”
So, how might Allah Made Me Funny be received? Tanya says “They say the greatest comedy comes from adversity and with the current climate at the moment their show must be hilarious. Comedy is a great way of putting a real face to the people that have to deal with the everyday racism they may be experiencing and to make it amusing is exceptionally impressive.”
Simon says “I think they’ll be received as a bit of a novelty but at the same time it’s going to help to break some of the stereotypes that the media has been pushing for the last couple of years. I checked the website and it didn’t even occur to me that the majority of Muslims in the US are African American, that’s how strong the image of the middle-eastern Muslim terrorist has become. In Australian the majority of Muslims are Turkish and have been here for years. So I hope that at least it will give a different talking point.”
Azhar discusses this stereotype. I asked him if in his travels he’d come across a Muslim community living within a Western community who had it ‘right’. He said, “there is a certain assumption that tends to underscore and underlie a lot of the discussion about Muslims in the west, which is the notion that Muslims are visitors to the west, or that they are foreigners to the west. I think that African American Muslims, as a social body and as a group, which by the way number in the couple of million, these are people who are as western as any other American. Also the Bosnian Muslims provide a fantastic example of a European Muslim phenomenon that has long history and deep roots. So I think that right off the bat, especially when you’re talking about Muslims integrating into the west etc, that’s predominantly a discussion about immigrants, from the Muslim world.”
I ask if part of Allah Made Me Funny’s aim is to start a dialogue about that issue. Azhar says “I think so, absolutely. The idea of western Muslim cultural identity, and the notion of developing indigenous Muslim culture that’s rooted in the west, that takes from the western traditions and borrows and incorporates and appropriates the western civilisational history and cultural expression, that’s clearly part of why we do what we do, how we locate our work in the larger framework, how we relate to other Muslim artists in the west.”
George likes the idea of a Muslim comedy show. He says “that’s cool because it waters down that whole thing about us v them, and we get to see what they go through, what those poor guys go through being compared to being terrorists, and they’re just people that live in a house and watch TV like us and eat their dinner and stuff. Prejudice comes in when you’re scared of the unknown and we don’t know much about Muslim people still, we know a bit more, but we really don’t know much about them, when the unknown is brought out there, people go ‘oh, that’s kind of like us anyway’.”
Kieran agrees “I reckon they’ll be huge, the best way to get people to overcome their prejudicial views is to embrace it and take the piss out of it. A comic is better at doing this than any politician. Pauline Hanson’s tirades were no match for the ‘I don’t like it’ comic single. Not overly funny, but appropriate and effective in making her look stupid.”
So, whether intentional or unintentional, it seems ‘ethnic comedy’ is providing a voice to citizens not otherwise accurately represented in mainstream entertainment or media. But what’s an ethnic comedian? I still don’t have a concise description. I do know this, as Preach says, “a German comic in Germany, is a comedian. A Lebanese comedian in Lebanon… they’re just comedians”.