Thank The Lord For Your Presence # 17

Last night's episode of Thank God You're Here (TGYH) was another find one, although not as good as last week's.

As usual, host Shane Bourne got things rolling by introducing us to the guest stars for this week: Pizza star and apparently Australia's only Turkish stand-up comedian Tahir Bilgic, Triple M radio host and former Late Show stalwart Tony Martin (I nearly used this image ... then I nearly used this one), New Zealand comedian and one-time skitHOUSE regular Cal Wilson and US comic and all-round funny guy Arj Barker. They performed in that order, so let's ignore ridiculously redundant 'judge' Tom Gleisner and just get on with it, shall we?

I found Tahir to easily be the least impressive this week, although this opening scene was probably the weakest 'script' the producers have prepared for quite a while. Certainly for all of this season. He played a businessman coming home late at night to find his wife waiting impatiently for him on their tenth wedding anniversary. I'm not sure if Tahir was simply struggling, or they had to cut a lot out of the scene before it could be broadcast (perhaps they just used up all of their material really quickly), but this scene was much shorter than the others. One of his better lines for the night came just as he was about to enter the scene; upon trying the door handle, he turned back to Shane and said, "It's locked." Entering the scene to a frosty reception from his fuming wife (who furiously ignored him as she angrily flicked through a magazine), Tahir went all 'panto' on us by turning to the audience and going, "Oooh!" His explanation for being so late was that the computer at work went down "... on me." Suggestive and crude, it made no sense (but I confess to laughing anyway). He then said it took a few hours, because "you know how slow computers are". Upon discovering that it was their ten year anniversary, he responded with, "A decade? [Exhales heavily] Feels like 50." His confession to his lovely wife that his thoughts as she walked down the aisle all those years ago was, "Why me?" didn't seem to bother her, and his admission to only marrying her so he could get into the country was dismissed as a joke. Things didn't look up when he told his wife he'd arranged for a celebratory dinner at Sizzler. Possibly because they've been closed for ten years (at least where I'm from). But his attempts to fire her up about the idea were amusing: "All you can eat! Come on!" All-in-all, though ... it just wasn't a very magical scene.

Tony was the second batsman for the night, and came out wearing a very limp superhero costume (which he later claimed was "pulling the ladies backstage"). He was "Flashman", and kept his monotone delivery throughout the scene, heightening the laughs for everyone. His three superpowers were superspeed, punctuality, and the ability to cast aspersions on people's character. His arch nemesis was an angry-letter-writing 87 year-old in a nursing home, called Barry. His hideout was Wilson's carpark, and his catch-cry is, "Watch out, he's evil!" because it keeps the public on their toes. His plan as a superhero is to start small and work his way up to terrorism by beginning with fare evaders (possibly via video piracy), which is a brilliant piece of comedy when you think about how quickly he came up with (and delivered) it. Then we get to Mrs Jenkins. It's not all that surprising that Tony's comedy style is so similar to that of Gleisner and his TGYH co-producers (made up of Santo Cilauro, Jane Kennedy, Rob Sitch and Michael Hirsh - as well as Creative Consultant Glenn Robbins); after all, he worked with most of them for years on The Late Show, The D-Generation, and other projects. So when he intentionally down-played his "female assistant" to be an old woman whose special ability is to "make a very nice cup of tea in a reasonable amount of time", it wasn't too shocking to then see an old woman enter the scene with Tony's lunch, dressed in a similar costume to the one he was wearing. And it clearly wasn't set up, because Tony's surprise (pointing to her and turning to the audience, humoured and delighted, crying out, "And that's her!") made it obvious he was as amused at his clever 'guess' as anyone watching. Speaking for myself, I thought it was hilarious. Not at all a shame that he inadvertently 'picked' the next twist, and not at all a conspiracy. Just a quick mind on behalf of Tony. At the close of the scene, he was asked to name one good reason why he shouldn't be fired as the city's superhero, and he countered by upping the stakes! "I'll give you three reasons ... [pause as he realises he's got nowhere to go with this] ... maybe just the one would be good, though ..."

The third special guest to try their luck was Cal, and she came out dressed as a beauty pageant contestant, complete with sash reading 'Miss Caicos'. Upon entering the scene, she began affecting amusing poses in the background (standing alongside four or five other contestants from different countries), while the host and co-host welcomed the audience back to the pageant, and then called Miss Caicos forward for her interview. Showing true catty jealousy, Cal gave all her attention to the male host of the show, going so far as to nudge the female co-host out of the way with her hip. Repeatedly. And then when she finally spoke, the accent she used had people laughing from the outset. It didn't matter what she said; the accent she came up with was perfectly hilarious. Some 'choice' quotes included: "I just having nice time with you, man ...", "I am chief export of Caicos, gross national product (turning to female co-host); that would be you ...", and when explaining how she knew she was no longer a tomboy when she was growing up: "I got, how you say, big breasticles. And they make me know I am a lady in the front". Her three goals after winning the pageant related to science ("I gonna learn how to spell it!"), nuclear proliferation ("That's a contraceptive, right?"), and Angelina Jolie & Brad Pitt ("That's right, I'm gonna split them up!"). We were then treated to three questions from the 'celebrity judging panel', consisting of Dr Karl Kennedy (Alan Fletcher), Kimberley Davies and swimmer Matt Welsh. Alan asked Cal what being a Unifed Ambassador entailed, and she responded that it meant she only gets fed once. Kimberley asked if she could get rid of one thing in the world, what would it be? Turning to look back at her fellow beauty pageant contestants, she replied, "Uh, ... Miss China!" And Matt mentioned a prior altercation with Miss Bolivia, asking what had happened there. "Oh, you know, girls have pillow fights, it was just a bit of fun, I scratch her eyes out." Her three dreams all involved Brad Pitt and a palm (or palm tree) in some way, which was clever thinking on her behalf to make them all fit the prompts she was given, but personally I didn't find them very funny. She made up for it, though, with her final thoughts: "To the judges, if I win, I put out." (I wonder if Tom thought this applied to him?)

Finally, we were treated to the hilarious stylings of American comedian Arj Barker. His scene involved him being the housemate from hell, and he fell into the role pretty quickly! In fact, he said afterwards that he found the whole scenario strangely familiar. Apparently emerging from sleeping in his bedroom at four in the afternoon ("Well, I went to bed at two in the afternoon, so what do you want from me?"), he joined his four other housemates in the kitchen for a household meeting. Arj was asked if he knew what it meant to live in a communal household, and he replied that it means they're all on myspace, they all help out, it's one-for-all and all-for-one, and then pointed to one of the girls, saying, "... so I mean if she has money in her purse, I'm gonna go ahead and borrow it." He was asked which cupboard stores the vacuum cleaner, and he replied with, "What's a vacuum cleaner?" Then he went out on his own a bit, coming up with the following gear out of nowhere: "I know you asked me to chip in for cleaning supplies, but I just don't think that's fair. I mean, why should I have to pay for something I'm not gonna use?" It was so clever, it made me wonder if maybe he hadn't slipped in some material from his stand-up routine or something. (If not, Mr Barker - no offense intended. Very well done. It was that impressive.) It certainly fitted in with the theme of the interrogation he was getting, though, because the next thing he was asked was what household duties he'd done in the past week. He answered that he'd emptied the trash ... on his Mac. Then his housemates opened the fridge and we saw that it was completely filled with beer. "What do we need that much beer for?" they asked him. "To get sh*tfaced!" he enthusiastically replied. Then they opened up the freezer and revealed that it was stacked from top to bottom with hot dogs. "We're vegetarians!" his housemates complained. "Well, put some lettuce on it!" came his snarky reply. "You're vegetarian," they informed him. His answer to that was brilliant: "Those are grain-fed ... hot dogs. It's like eating a vegetarian." Then the housemates launched their final complaint on Arj for letting his 'family' stay over. From the Swedish backpacker babe to the tall Jamaican (?) dude he claimed were his sister and brother, it turns out that Arj's family heritage is somewhat confused (Jamaican, Swedish, Pakistani and American all rolled into one). When asked if he's turning the place into some kind of backpacker hostel, he replied that no, no one's getting hostile (pronouncing this in Arj's natural [American] way, "hos-til" [instead of the correct way, "hos-tile"], made this a very witty comeback). He then went on the attack, demanding that these people "... deserve to come here to Australia and find out what made America great!" When his 'brother' entered the room, he asked his sceptical housemates, "Can't you guys see the resemblance?", before pulling the waistband of his pants forward and comparing the hair on the head of his 'brother', with the hair ... well, you get the idea. It was a very amusing scene and Arj seemed to slip perfectly into the nature of the show. For a first-timer, he was first-rate.

The first of the pre-recorded bits was set on the Network Ten morning program (which generally comes a distant third in the ratings, after Channel Seven's Sunrise and Channel Nine's Today show), known as 9am with david and kim (lower case intended, because - you know - that's trendy). David Reyne introduced the segment (fairly pointlessly, seeing as we only saw him for three seconds - and he wasn't credited at the end of the show), and then Ann-Maree Biggar interviewed our four special guests in a segment called "In the Kitchen ..." Dressed in all white gear and standing in front of a kitchen island covered with food and cooking utensils, Ann-Maree asked the hard questions and our celebrities gave the funny answers. She began by congratulating Tony for having just opened his first restaurant, to which Tony replied, "And I'm a dentist!" Arj's new style of restaurant is apparently the kind where the customers are required to cook their meals themselves, leaving the staff free to "go out the back and smoke cigarettes". Tony had to fire his head chef recently due to bestiality ("not good in the restaurant for the diners, and distracting, I find"). Tahir described the difference between table salt and sea salt thus: "Table salt is easier to get - from the table. Who wants to go to the sea to get salt?" Tony told us that at a recent dinner engagement for the Prime Minister, Tony had decided to cook him nothing at all, instead telling the PM, "I know we promised we'd cook you something good, but it wasn't a core promise". The web addresses the three boys gave out where as follows: Tahir, Tony and Arj. As I type this, none of them are working addresses (but give it a month and they'll probably be flourishing!). Strangely, I had nothing at all in my notes from Cal's contribution to this bit.

The second pre-recorded bit placed our heroes in the role of film director during the taping of Picnic at Hanging Rock II: Miranda's Return. This bit featured appearances by Jane Hall (shown here with life partner Vince Colosimo) and Andy Lee (shown here with life partner Hamish Blake, haha - Andy's on the left) in the main roles being directed by Cal, Tony, Arj and Tahir. While being interviewed on camera, Arj described his cinematic style as getting a big bucket of popcorn and not sitting too close to the front, before realising the interviewer meant directing movies. When it was revealed that he got his start directing commercial safety videos, Arj confirmed that his debut was Keep Your Hands Out Of The Fryer, and he first met Andy while working on Hey, Those Paperclips Are Sharp! When Tony was asked what Andy Lee brings to his role, his reply was, "Trousers, a hat ..." Tahir informed us that he chose Jane for her role because of her "cheapness". When she was asking him a question about her character, he got distracted because he was listening to Shannon Noll on his headphones. Cal tried directing Andy on how to run into the house with his wooden leg by describing that he should run like a gimp (and then demonstrating it). Arj preferred Andy to skip, instead. Andy then asked Arj how his character lost his leg in the first place, and Arj answered, "Skipping accident". When someone pointed out that the Harley Davidson motorcycle he's requested didn't fit the 1890s time period, Arj insisted that they simply get some horses to pull the Harley. Tony decided that the best way to direct Andy on how to kiss Jane passionately for the scene was to grab Jane's head, say, "Look and learn!", and then dive right in. And Cal wasn't at liberty to explain how the movie ended, but whispered conspiratorially (while pointing at Andy), "Not really a guy!"

The group scene was set in a Where Are They Now?-style show called Now and Then. Tony, Cal and Tahir entered the scene as normal, and played three of the four stars of the ficticious, long-since-cancelled TV series A Town in the Valley. When asked if it felt like ten years since the show was cancelled, Tony replied, "No! It feels like nine." When Tahir was asked to describe the show for anyone who hadn't seen it, he cleverly stalled for time by saying, "Who hasn't seen it? Everybody's seen it!", then turning to the audience and demanding, "Seriously, who hasn't seen it, huh?" When one joker presumably put up his hand, Tahir snapped at him, "Get out!" Then he told the host that it was a kind of drama/comedy: "Basically, we tried to be dramatic but were poor actors." Cal played a clumsy vet whose complicated character involved how she used sharp implements and yet kept falling over and stabbing people with them. She later became a real vet but only works with stuffed animals. Tony was revealed to be the owner of the town pub, and his famous catch-cry was, "Who wants an enormous amount of beer?" When repeating the phrase in his speech impediment (which he'd lost just moments before coming on stage), it sounded basically the same, but he claimed it was a subtle difference, drawing to light the many people who suffered from it. When asked why Rod couldn't be with them tonight, Tony replied that he'd fallen into a wheat thresher, but that it was important they acknowledge that he'd done it for charity. It turned out that Rod was alive and well and in Hollywood, and this is where we "crossed live" to Arj, whose favourite memories of working on the show was when he put laxatives in the lunch, and they all got to leave early that day. The host asked him to tell us again how his character left the series, and Arj laughingly asked if he really needed to remind us: ("I mean, come on! As if I really need to remind you!") When the host insisted, he laughed, "All right, I'll tell you ...", and then proceeded to tell us how his character, the mayor (who was germaphobic), took a drink from a glass of water in one episode, only to realise that someone with a coldsore had already taken a drink from the glass - resulting in the mayor running screaming from the town. But perhaps the best line from this scene was Tony telling us that he's now the voice of the GE Money Genie.

It was an excellent episode (possibly one of the finest), and although I wasn't too impressed with Cal's material in the group scene or either of the two pre-recorded bits, she easily made up for it in her turn as Miss Caicos. That being said, however, I thought Tony and Arj also did a brilliant job throughout each of their segments. The other thing I noted was that there were so many celebrity cameos this week. David Reyne, Ann-Maree Biggar, Alan Fletcher, Kimberley Davies, Matt Welsh, Andy Lee and Jane Hall. I wonder if everyone's clambering to get on the show or if the producers just have a lot of weight around the network now so can make whatever they want happen.

Only three episodes left of the series. And I hear whispers that they don't plan to make the show anymore after that. I hope that's not true. It's the best comedy to turn up on Australian TV in a long time (probably since Frontline), and will be sorely missed.


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