The Umbilical Brothers on Speedmouse

So you finally got that hot date you’ve been eyeing for a long time. You have your outfit ready and your hair is on point. Only one problem – you don’t know where to go.
Lucky for you Dave Collins, better known as The Umbilical Brother with the hair, has that little detail sorted. He encourages you to bring your date to their upcoming show ‘Speedmouse’, promising the best first date you’ll ever have.
“You go together, you have a great time, you’re both laughing, and then after the date you laugh about what you were laughing about at the show, it’s just the perfect first date,” he laughs.
First developed and performed in 2001, The Umbies’ most beloved show Speedmouse is back after been performed across countless countries. Now, Dave is keen to be back on the road with fellow Umbie, Shane Dundas.
“I can’t wait! We’re doing Speedmouse and we’ve done it so many times, that each time we do it we replace parts of the show with new things, just to keep ourselves and the audience kind of interested… more so ourselves,” he laughs.
“But now we’ve done it so many that the show is pretty much a new show for anyone who knows the DVD; there’s so many parts of the show now that are completely different from the original that we probably should call it a different name.”
Still guaranteed to be full of the stuff you love best, Speedmouse is a live action, fast paced, rewind, slow motion, frame-by-frame adventure where these two hilarious legends create the impossible out of a microphone and a unique physical ability that has no equal. One such section of the show is the crowd favourite finger wars; a section which now features brand new fingers.
“Now we give each other completely new fingers,” he chuckles. “We do still do the thing where the audience yell out different sports and they can yell out whatever they want. The other night someone yelled out Quidditch, and we had to do bloody Quidditch so we were riding on fingers like brooms, it was hilarious. We are still to this day getting ones that we’ve never had before which is incredible because we’ve done the show you know, tens of thousands of times.”
It’s during these shows with the audience involvement, that you notice the quick wit from Dave and Shane, as they respond on the fly in unison and are very much on the same wavelength.
“This is something we’ve always had and that’s one of the reasons we call ourselves The Umbilical Brothers; we needed a name that suggested we were linked because we’ve always had that innate connection into one another, that we just know where the other one is going and it’s just always been there and hopefully it will stick around for a few more years,” he smiles.
“We’re still quite young, it’s only been about 27 years. But it’s been there the whole time, we’re very very lucky to have found that.”
The duo are an international comedy phenomenon who have so far won a couple of BAFTAs, an Emmy, the Critics’ Choice at Edinburgh and the Helpmann Award for Best Comedy Performers, and have performed in 37 countries with six different shows. To say they’ve found their calling is an understatement, and Dave credits the variety in their shows as the reason they’ve continued performing for as long as they have.
“Because we have six 90 minute shows, we’re not doing the same show all the time,” he says. “We get most of our work outside Australia, and depending on what country we are in that depends on what sort of show we are doing; we’re not ever stuck with doing the one show forever and ever and ever. We are constantly mixing it up.”
Despite admitting a love for mixing it up in regards to the show, Speedmouse is the show Dave feels most comfortable in, and gets excited each time the two get to stuff around on stage together.
“It is so much fun to be so comfortable inside our show. We’re not this comfortable in the newest show, Not Suitable For Children, which we are just about to take to overseas in May,” Dave explains. “Well we are comfortable with it, but we aren’t stuffing around as much as we are here; this is the show that we are so comfortable with that we can just go in any direction and we know that we will be there for each other, but better than that… we know the audience are with us as well.
“And because they know the show so well, a lot of people really don’t mind,” he continues, “in fact they want us to stuff around. And when we have license to stuff around it’s jut the most fun show for everybody. It’s just really fun!”
Find that hot date, book your tickets and prepare for a night of quality laughs with The Umbilical Brothers. Tickets via www.umbilicalbrothers.com or from the venue.
When & Where: Kyneton Town Hall, Kyneton – April 5, GPAC, Geelong – April 6, Eastbank Centre Shepparton – April 7 & Lighthouse Theatre, Warrnambool – April 14.
Written by Talia Rinaldo