Stand-up comedy is subjective. We know this, it’s each to their own. However, currently being well into the Melbourne International Comedy Festival, all the evidence is suggesting that Marcel Lucont will be the one guaranteed to make you laugh.
Self-described as ‘flâneur, raconteur, bon-viveur, and easily the greatest UK-based French comedian around’, Marcel (as seen on ABC1’s Set List and Comedy Central at The Comedy Store) is giving you the chance to witness great French humour when he returns to the Melbourne Comedy Festival for a limited run of his acclaimed improvised show, Whine List.
“It’s perfect for Australia, a country that claims to have no worries… I wish to remind them that they should have worries,” Marcel reveals. “The world is not a good place. It’s important to air your whines and grapes about it.”
Coming off a successful tour of the UK last year, the deadpan Frenchman will bring louche musings, dry wit and Gallic superiority in this show where he creates a unique Whine List every night. At each show, attendees are given a questionnaire at the beginning from which the finest ‘whines’ are chosen for that nights’ performance.
“There will be no solution from me, they can sort that shit out themselves,” he smirks. “We can at least laugh at their problems in front of a room full of strangers. It’s like a group therapy experience where most people probably will leave more depressed.”
Essentially, Marcel has created a hilarious show that cashes’ in on humanity’s obsessions with narcissistic self-help, as he offers his audiences the opportunity to air their gripes, moan and whine in front of a man who has plenty of his own. It’s comic genius.
Originally influenced by the television show Set List (Sky Atlantic), which sees comedians get a never-before seen “set list” of bizarre, outrageous, and ridiculous topics as the audience follows along on the screen behind the performer, this type of comedy is all about improvisation and brings with it a completely new experience of comics.
“For that [Set List] there was a lot of improvising and I thought I could do this for an entire show, and I was right,” he laughs. “It’s just something I realised I could do very well, it’s easy because for me it’s [Whine List] their own input, and I throw my genius which creates super comedy… never have I failed yet.”
A nominee for the Best International Guest 2016 New Zealand Comedy Guild, winner of the Best Comedy 2013 Fringe World Awards, shortlisted for Best Comedy 2016 Fringe World Awards and winner of the 2015 Chortle Award (UK), Marcel has the qualifications of a good comedian, and with rave reviews from all over the world, this particular show is proving to be a ‘must-see’.
The only thing left to do being buying tickets and finding out what Marcel is all about, he leaves us on one final note about his comedy show: “How you take the show, it’s up to you. If you are the one laughing at the misdemeanours perhaps it will be less depressing for you.”
The only way to know is go and find out!
Catch his performance at The Coopers Malthouse, Beckett Theatre (113 Sturt St, Southbank) from
10-14 April & 17-22 April @ 9:40pm; 15 & 22 April @ 8:40pm.
Booking via micf.tickets.red61.com
Written by Talia Rinaldo