Tom Walker And Bridie Connell: Motherfather (MICF)

Kicking off at 11pm, when all the other shows have gone to bed, the MICF performers come out in droves to catch the end of the night offerings of their peers and contemporaries. It's the bracket of the festival where any rules or guidelines suddenly go out the window, and the cacophony of weird and wonderful performers can go wild.

MotherFather is the new improv sketch super-duo of Tom Walker and Bridie Connell, both of whom are going all out with their own respective shows as well as their late-night offering. Going off the diving board with just a single word from the audience, the pair jumps straight into an hour of totally improvised sketches and characters. From start to finish there is no more audience participation or suggestions, the two just work off each other to create remarkable and side-splitting pieces of brilliant comedy.

MotherFather is the type of show that the festival was created for. The character work is phenomenal, the jokes seem impossibly well rounded to be made up on the fly, and Connell and Walker are aggressively and faultlessly symbiotic. The two are totally natural and nuanced performers, getting laughs from the most subtle of gestures and deliveries. Being among their fellow performers undoubtedly aids their abilities, but there's certainly no denying the raw skills of these two fantastic entertainers.

As a final breath into every night of the festival, this is a show that screams to be seen. To marvel in the proficiency of Walker and Connell as improvisers is not only impressive and interesting, it's one of the most genuinely funny performances around.

Tom Walker and Bridie Connell present MotherFather till 22 Apr at Melbourne Town Hall, part of the Melbourne International Comedy Festival.