Acts You Don’t Want To Miss At The 2016 Sydney Comedy Festival

Sydney Comedy Festival is in full swing, and if you still haven't had a chance to suss out your must-see acts yet (let's face it, the bill is bursting with talent), here are a few shows we recommend you add to your list.

Catherine Deveny: Pushy Women

Catherine Deveny hosts ladies who lunch bike at the grand Town Hall – comedian Becky Lucas, writer and performer Annaliese Constable, cabaret stars Lady Sings It Better and actor Miranda Tapsell. That’s who’s been announced so far – but there will be more, and there will be more topics on the table than just bikes…

The event has become a mainstay in Melbourne – but makes it way to Sydney for the first time this year.

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And the best part? Before you head along, you’re invited to head along to the Pushy Women Excursion, a free guided women’s cycle through Sydney, all the way to Town Hall.

24 Apr, Sydney Town Hall

story club: town hall arena spectacular

Story Club makes it to the big leagues this Comedy Festival, taking over Sydney Town Hall on a Saturday. The eight-year-old monthly Sydney storytelling night (and podcast, and once-upon-a-time ABC TV program), tonight hosted by writer and actor Rob Carlton, features Osher Gunsberg of The Bachelor, journalist and author Kate McClymont,The Checkout’s Alex Lee and Mark Sutton, and season regular Zoe Norton Lodge, reading their true stories from a novelty-sized book, seated in a giant armchair.

Who wouldn’t want to be regaled with funny/touching/uncomfortable/witty stories in a room of people warm with those laughs (Town Hall’s not so draughty is it?)?

Not convinced? Proceeds from the night will be donated to Marrickville Legal Centre, to pay for integral domestic violence support services.

23 Apr, Sydney Town Hall

anne edmonds: that’s eddotainment!

I don’t know if I’ve laughed as hard watching any other Australian comic as I did watching Anne Edmonds last year. She made my sides physically hurt. It may have been the sections about having a Catholic mother, substituting affection for ham. It may have been because of the moment where she picked up a banjo or took on one of many characters, it may have been because of her story of taking a hangover with her onto the plane on the way to a family vacation. I saw my future self in her, and I didn’t feel bad about it.

So inevitably her new show will be just as good, and we’ll all have a good chuckle.

Credentials? National Finalist in RAW Comedy, nominated for Best Emerging Comedy Talent at Adelaide Fringe, winner of the Piece Of Wood Award (best show, as voted by a committee of comedians) for the show described above at last year’s MICF. Oh and she supported Marc Maron on tour.

6 & 7 May, The Giant Dwarf

daniel sloss: dark

Scottish 25-year-old comic Daniel Sloss makes his way from sold out Edinburgh Fringe seasons (10,000 people a year is a lot of people) to Sydney. You might recognise him from Conan, Sunday Night At Palladium, John Bishop Show, Russell Howard’s Good News, Michael McIntyre Roadshow, Late Late Show With Craig Ferguson… or maybe you caught his own BBC show, The Adventures Of Daniel.

Fun fact: he was the youngest comedian to perform a solo season in London’s West End (at 19!). He did a TEDx talk at 21. He’s working on an American pilot….

He’s essentially one to watch, and his dark humour might just be the touch of reality we need here.

13 May, Enmore Theatre

becky lucas: baby

Honestly Becky Lucas did a sterling job working the crowd at Spectrum Now’s A Night Of Stand-Up With The Workaholics. Considering the crowd was largely made up of punters unfamiliar with her work (and feeling jipped because it wasn’t an exclusively Workaholics show), her jokes about y’know, being a young woman, and the men that inevitably surround you, and make your life a goddamn pain, actually made a mark – more than a few people will be buying tix to her solo show to hear more of her incisive, maybe too real barbs.

It’s Lucas’ second show at the festival, after being a RAW Comedy National Finalist in 2013, and debuting her full-length set High Tide last year. Oh and she’s opened for Joel Creasey and Wil Anderson. Aimed at “people who haven’t sorted out their life yet”, the self-described “lazy feminist” may even make you think.

10 – 15 May, Enmore Theatre