Melbourne International Comedy Festival review

Madonna and Britney are blasting out of the speakers of Max Watt’s, the clubbiest venue at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival, as a packed house awaits the arrival of Nath Valvo on stage. 

It’s a scene that was unthinkable not so long ago as Melbourne spent half of 2020 in hard lockdown, and Valvo tears out of the blocks in full ‘we’re back!’ celebratory mode. And for those nostalgic for the ‘before times’, this show delivers no shortage of comforting familiarity, arguably to a fault. 

Valvo’s ascent to the upper echelons of the Aussie comedy scene has been powered by hyper-relatable material about relationship expectations, parents being weirdos, resisting responsibility, social embarrassments and straight assumptions about gay men.  

When this stuff hits the mark, it obliterates it, Valvo turbo-charging punchlines with sustained physicality and outstanding technical proficiency.  He can knock multiple laughs out of straightforward setups through smart writing and force of personality, evidenced here by some hugely enjoyable gear about online recipes, true crime fans and Australians’ obsession with owning property. 

It’s a typically all-out performance with a lot of extreme affect, which does run the risk of repetition and even irritation when the bits don’t match the effort (a ‘scary stories’ interstitial is a whole lot of setup for not a lot of payoff). There’s more to admire than lament here but it’s not the choreography powerhouse his 2019 award-nominated show was. 

Some tropes – real coupledom isn’t quite what the movies have led us to believe, for example – are borderline parodic in their familiarity, while stories about squiffy mums, doofus dads and schoolyard gossip from someone who also talks about having their 40th birthday in sight aren’t getting any less incongruous. 

Valvo is an exceptional performer who has deservedly found an avid audience and clearly knows how to show them a good time - just don’t expect anything particularly fresh this year.

Review date: 2 Apr 2021
Reviewed by: Patrick Horan
Reviewed at: Melbourne International Comedy Festival