'The most important thing I have ever seen as an actor'

Michelle Brasier picks her comedy favourites

As her show Legacy opens at the Edinburgh Fringe, Australian comedian Michelle Brasier shares her Perfect Playlist of comedy favourites.

Sick Jan

Sick Jan is the testing ground for me to see if we will get along. If you don't think this is incredible - I do not think you're funny. It's a hard and fast rule.

Please enjoy this one-man operetta about a tax professional.

Chris Fleming is so good. The way he does songs and jams too many syllables into every line is so brilliant. I really love the absolute commitment to musical comedy from someone who cannot really do music. It is so so so funny.

Sad Women

Sad Women is an episode from Hot Department's Grouse House series Dark Web. It's won a tonne of awards and features Rhys Nicholson as a hauntingly beautiful nun. God it's good. Just watch it. If you don't know about Hot Department - welcome. There will be nudity. Go see them this year at Fringe!

Jennifer Coolidge's hum

This is the most important thing I have ever seen as an actor. This is the holy text. Vintage Jennifer Coolidge. Absolutely stunning work. There's an Aunty Donna video where I walk into a wall like a Sim and people ask me about it a lot. I say, 'It's because of Jennifer Coolidge's hum!’

Cole Escola's Oh Mary

This is the best play I have ever seen and if you can afford to fly to New York and see it you must. You just have to watch it. Cole Escola did no research before writing this, which is the perfect way to write a historical show in my opinion. Cole plays Mary Todd Lincoln in the days leading up to her husband's assassination.

Escola's version of this woman is an alcoholic gremlin and failed cabaret star and let me say babe, I relate.

Operation Mincemeat

Seeing a musical like this is so inspiring. It's everything I adore. Big silly musical numbers that don't take themselves seriously but still manage to have heart. It feels very Monty Python back in the day. Really fringey. Made by - I can only assume - a bunch of stone cold freaks. And I LOVE freaks.

I am so here for silliness taking back musicals. We gotta let them be what they are – very, very silly.

Aunty Donna's The Most Upsetting Guessing Game In The World Episode 1

Admittedly I am in this but ignore me - ignore everyone and just watch Mish Wittrup lose her mind. Her worst nightmare is that her friends have secrets behind her back and this game is just that.

It’s a take on the improv game Party Quirks where she has to guess the many features her 'guests' have, and those features range from 'The Matrix but it's piss' to 'You're made of friendly snakes'.

There's a moment where she has almost got everything - she's even guessed previously, that the snakes Broden was made of were friendly - but when she's asked to put it all together she can't remember that they are friendly, and in response to 'What kind of snakes?' she so confidently says 'Vipers!' and it's the best and funniest thing I have ever seen in my life

• Michelle Brasier: Legacy is on at 7pm in the Gilded Balloon Patter Hoose

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Published: 27 Jul 2024