The Wonder Years

By his own admission, Charlie Pickering, stand-up comedian and host of Ten's popular news program, The Project, has had an interesting and eventful 2012. From visiting the iconic Incan ruins of Machu Picchu in Peru to attending a pre-election event for incumbent US president Barack Obama where Jay-Z and Bruce Springsteen were the headlining performers, he's had the chance to see firsthand some of the human race's most awe-inspiring monuments and be in the presence of genuine greatness.

While Pickering's something of a political animal, he's not so bipartisan that he was keen to check out Obama's opponent Mitt Romney. “If I got stuck in Iowa watching Kid Rock perform at a Romney function instead of seeing Jay-Z, Springsteen and Obama, I don't think I would have ever forgiven myself,” he admits with a laugh.

Nevertheless, the 35-year-old is still wondering if we, the people, are maybe cruising a little. After all, over 40 years ago some smart folks did what Pickering dubs “some serious maths” and determined that they had a pretty good shot at sending a group of astronauts from the earth to the moon and bringing them back again. “That's a bold and massive risk to take, and I wonder if we have that in us these days,” he wonders.

That's the core of Pickering's stand-up show, One Giant Leap (you know, as in the late Neil Armstrong's “One giant leap for mankind”). “The basic idea of One Giant Leap is to take a bit of a look at where we're at – the human race, that is – and ask if we're performing anywhere near the level the human race reached when we sent a man to the moon in 1969. Was that the high-water mark? Was that as good as we got? Did we take our foot off the accelerator and just coast ever since?”

He's quick to point out that humanity hasn't completely dropped the ball since '69. For example, there are some pretty cool apps available, he admits. “And we did have a guy parachute from space,” he laughs. “Someone fell the greatest distance. But when I was in Washington, I visited the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum and I got to look at the lunar module. Just looking at the door of the re-entry pod, and how complicated it was to latch that door, I thought that door alone might be too complicated for us to understand. Never mind getting to the moon and back, I don't think we could properly operate this door.”

Of course, Pickering isn't simply taking shots at the rest of us for not living up to our potential. “I do a pretty scathing self-analysis in the show as well. I ask myself pretty honestly if I'm contributing in our march of progress. But what I've learned over time is that I offer far less wisdom than I did as, say, a twenty-five-year-old. I have enough wisdom to know that I offer no decent wisdom.”

Mainly, though, One Giant Leap sees Pickering hoping that the human race keeps hold of our capacity for wonder. “We need to make sure we don't lose that, the wonder that has driven us over thousands and thousands and thousands of years to learn more and understand more and create more,” he says. “That fascination has got us this far – we can't lose it now.”