After leaving the University of Wollongong armed with a couple of BAs, Patrick Lenton has contributed a steady stream of creative projects to Sydney theatre. He has written some bizarre and eccentric short pieces for numerous group shows. His first full length play Implausible People was lauded as ‘one of the funniest plays to have graced Sydney’s stages in a long time’. He also has other creative outlets including his blog The Book I’m Drinking that combines literary reviews, drinking and comedy. I posed a number of questions to Patrick to discover what makes him tick.
Asked what prompted him to begin writing comedy, Patrick mused ‘For as long as I can remember I’ve wanted to be a writer. Or a wizard. It wasn’t until I started studying creative writing at university that I discovered that almost inevitably, that the writing would be comedy. It was completely intuitive and unplanned. I’d hand in a tragic tale of one woman’s experiences during the blitzkrieg, and people would be slapping their meaty thighs and guffawing. I decided I’d go with it, and became addicted to the sweet nectar that is laughter.’
When it comes what influences have crept into his writing he remarked ‘There is something subtle and sinister about the things that have influenced my writing. For example, after seeing one of my very early plays, a bunch of people starting talking to me about ‘The Mighty Boosh’ as if I automatically knew who and what they were. I played along. After it continued for an uncomfortably long time, I finally got around to watching the show, and found it hilarious. Now it really does influence me. There’s a lot of UK comedy that I’d love to follow in the giant footsteps of- Black Books, The Green Wing, Garth Marenghi’s Dark Place… In more literary terms, I’d like to think my writing is what would happen if Kurt Vonnegut, Tom Stoppard and Oscar Wilde had tea together – ie a time-travelling abomination.’
A lot of comedy writers have come from a performance background. I wondered if Patrick has ever taken to the stage. Patrick told me that ‘comedy performance is something I’ve always been interested in and something I’ve dabbled in fairly consistently through the years. I’ve done some stand-up here and there and some cabaret, etc, but it always takes second place to my writing in some ways. There’s a different set of responsibilities and stresses revolving around performance, and in many ways I’m lazy. But I certainly wouldn’t rule it out in the future. Like many writers, I’m a frustrated performer.’
One such example of Patrick’s performance experience was that of The Bracket Creeps. He explained that they were ‘Australia’s only poetry boyband (that) existed to fill a niche – a lack of poetry boybands in Australia. We were a quartet of satirical performance poets, strutting around the stage in purple suits and parodical verse. One of the members, Daniel East, co-wrote ‘Sexy Tales of Paleontology’ with me and Bridget Lutherborrow. We travelled around Australia for a few years, doing some hilariously ill-concieved gigs: people tended to only see the word ‘poetry’ in the name and hire us, not realising we were primarily comics. Picture an Anglican girls school, pleated, ponytailed and sitting patiently in their auditorium, as we bounded onto stage, opening with our “syphilis quartet” poems. Like all boybands though, we had a very messy breakup. People say if there’s more than one Bracket Creep in the room, there’ll be blood in the carpet. That’s why Jimmy Bracket fled to Mexico. Will we ever reform? I’d like to say yes. I think there’s a future for the Bracket Creeps, and unlike what Lachie Bracket will tell you, it’s not in heroin running.’
As comedic performances are dependent heavily on skills such as timing, vocal delivery and physical gestures, I was curious to learn whether Patrick wrote the parts with particular actors in mind. ‘As a general rule, I don’t write with actors in mind’, Patrick remarked. ‘The world of theatre is such a risque, fast paced environment, you never know who you’ll con into saying words. But part of the process that I enjoy the most about theatre, is the period after the casting where I get to start adapting the characters to suit specific actors. This time around, with ‘Sexy Tales …’ I had much more of a say with casting than I usually do, because of the more production role I’ve had to undertake with the fringe format. And our cast is ridiculously good, and suit the characters so well that I’d love to have claimed I wrote specifically for them.’
That brings us to the plug for Patrick’s latest production, Sexy Tales of Paleontology, which will be performed at the 2010 Sydney Fringe Festival. Created during his Fraser Studio’s Off The Shelf hothouse theatre residency, it is described as ‘a hysterical, flamboyant and ethically dubious meeting of science and business. With robots. And puppets!’ He has assembled a brilliant team to bring this production to the stage,with Daniel East & Bridget Lutherborrow co-writing. Anne-Maree Magi is directing (ably assisted by Gavin Roach) and Patrick Weyland-Smith (from the Australian Institute of Music) providing the score.
Sexy Tales… will be performed at The Boiler Room (at The Factory Theatre, 105 Victoria Rd, Marrickville) from the 16th to the 19th of September as well as the 24th. Tickets are $20 (full)/$16(concession) and can be booked through the Sydney Fringe website
Many thanks to Patrick for his time.