2005 - 'I'm With Stupid'

Chortle

Justin Kennedy is something of a comedy livewire: animated and physical, he brings an engaging vibrancy to his stand-up.

It serves him well in this, his third Melbourne show, in which he explores the ideas of the subconscious self. Here he makes real those nagging voices in your head telling you too late that you’ve forgotten your keys, compelling you to do something entirely out of character or playing bad pop songs on your internal iPod.

So once the basic differences between Jungian and Freudian philosophies are explained – oh yes, there’s meat on these bones – it’s on to the more straightforward fun of trying to work out why your mind plays such tricks on you.

At first, Kennedy does this as a straight monologue, enjoyable and pacy, in which he imagines what that mischievous id is plotting. But then, the subconscious becomes an actual character – and an inexplicably French one at that.

It’s here the wheels start to wobble. It feels as if he runs out of ideas halfway through the show, so starts repeating them – slightly differently – to make up the time. After that comes some completely unrelated material grafted awkwardly on. How we got on to dinosaurs, I’m still not sure.

But there are plenty of laughs to be had before he runs out of momentum. Aside from the innate likeability, Kennedy proves himself a witty, breezily conversational comic. For a man only three years into his stand-up career this show, although flawed, demonstrates a whole heap of potential. And it’s not the voices telling me to say that …

Steve Bennett

BEAT

Justin Kennedy is a smart man. He's smart enough to get into MENSA but not smart enough to realise that this isn't a very good drawcard for the ladies. Actually he's not smart enough to get into MENSA (he screwed up the online application twice) but he's smart enough to realise that it would make for some good laughs to pretend he was.

The brain, in all its glory, is the subject of Kennedy's I'm With Stupid, and it's a very clever show. We're given a tour of the subconscious mind as the comic asks why it is that we so often do things that are obviously against our own self interest. Kennedy's theory is that our unconscious mind is like a backseat driver who is pretty much our worst enemy and as the show progresses this proposition gains an increasingly persuasive weight. He points out all of the stupid, self destructive idiocies that he, and we, are prone to play out, and there are plenty of laughs on the way. It takes a while to warm to his style, which is nervously skittish and sometimes a little rushed. But the writing is excellent and makes for some memorable moments, rarely flagging. He's also a good character actor, even allowing his subconscious to take over his body at one point (turns out that everyone's subconscoious is an arrogant Frenchman). In a Festival that's been divisible into the two camps of very smart and very stupid, Kennedy acts as a welcome arbitrator between the two. Enlightening.

John Bailey

The Program

For too many comics, a festival show is a chance to do an hour of their typical stand up, flitting listlessly from topic to topic until they find an excuse to bag Eddie McGuire/ John Howard/ women. Thankfully, Justin Kennedy is not one of these comics.

For his show this year, I'm With Stupid, Kennedy has set himself the task of exploring the subconscious, and has taken to the challenge with gusto, even giving his own subconscious a silly French accent and a hat. The show is an admirable success, taking some of the more complex ideas of psychoanalysis and making them both understandable and funny, two prerequisites for comedic success.

The start is simple enough, with a few gags to warm up the crowd, which were made largely at the expense of the comic-unfriendly basement room at Flinders Lane's Duckboard House. Once he gets into the swing of the main material, the gags flow thick and fast. Creative use has been made of the sparse multimedia on offer in the room - some music, conversation between Kennedy and prerecorded voice from his subconscious, and spectacular lighting effects (light on... light off!!) - to add to the vibe.

Kennedy is establishing himself as an intelligent and clever comic who stands out from the mire of mediocre Melbourne males.

Ari Sharp

2004 - 'Simple Pleasures'

No-one actually reviewed this show though it was quite good I thought.

Justin Kennedy

2003 - 'Successful Losing: How to be a Spectacular Failure'

chortle.co.uk

Successful Losing, as the astute may be able to figure out, is a loose collection of sketches simultaneously celebrating and mocking life's failures.

It's a hit and miss affair, but generally better than you might expect from the premise - or indeed the overextended one-joke introductory 'lecture'.

Mostly that's down to the upbeat performances, especially from Justin Kennedy, the most naturally funny of the trio. But the sharp banter between all three provides a strong backbone to the comedy.

Their lively performances and on-stage chemistry gets them over some rough patches - a familiar parody of theatre in education groups or a couple of all-too-simple reversal-of-logic sketches - and raises the better-written elements even higher.

The formal skits may not live up to the enjoyment of the less rigid out-of-character interaction, but this is ultimately an hour of good, undemanding fun.

Steve Bennett