Latest Reviews

The next generation of Australian comedians has been unleashed upon us. And how grateful we should be. Last night’s Raw Comedy Final produced a satisfyingly talented and diverse bunch of young stars, no doubt making the judge’s decision all that much harder.

Wil Anderson proved to be an easy-going and entertaining host for the evening. And previous Raw winner Hannah Gadsby had the capacity crowd in the palm of her hand while the judges deliberated.

There can only be one winner, of course, and WA’s Michael Workman, after only four months in the biz, has won himself the coveted trip to the Edinburgh festival. Workman’s five minute routine, which included a poem about schizophrenic farm animals, had a dark, surrealist edge and was confidently delivered and very well received by the crowd.

Thirteen comics, including a set of twins, whittled down from 675 entrants from across the country, gave their all in front of judges including Lawrence Leung, from Lawrence Leung’s Choose Your Own Adventure (ABC TV) and Chris Scaddan from Triple J.

Charles Barrington (Anthony Rogers) from Victoria and Ash Walmsey from Qld were the worthy Runners Up. Rogers delivered a unique and poised performance, leaving little doubt of the success ahead of him.

The Best First Time Entrant in Raw Comedy went to Victoria’s Don Tran. Tran delivered a straight five minutes of continuous unrelated jokes, each as funny as the next. His “I wonder if Kevin Rudd has ever referred to his genitals as the stimulus package” had to be the hit joke of the night. If he can keep the calibre and sheer volume of jokes coming, there’s no doubt we’ll soon be seeing much more of Tran in the near future.

Previous winners of Raw include Neil Sinclair, Jonathan Schuster, Hannah Gadsby and Josh Thomas.


RAW COMEDY NATIONAL GRAND FINAL

Venue: Melbourne Town Hall, Main Hall
Date/Time: Sunday 19 April, 5:00pm