Melbourne International Comedy Festival review

Fergus Neal has millions of views on TikTok and the confidence and cadence of a club comedian, even in his Melbourne comedy festival debut. He’s good at chatting with the audience and has an easy manner to his performance.

What he doesn’t have, however, is a show. Advertised as 50 minutes, Fergalicious comes in about ten minutes short, even with plenty of padding.

He tells us about the paparazzo turned mayor of Geelong, Darryn Lyons, without any comic commentary and – most oddly – shares, message-by-message, a bland online exchange he had with feminist writer Clementine Ford that has zero tension, jokes or context. It seems like he did something she challenged, then they settled it, but what it was is never mentioned. And why we should care is even more elusive.

Neal claims to be an activist now, as he was pictured at the Australian Open tennis tournament wearing a T-shirt saying: ‘Where is Peng Shuai?’ For the uninitiated, she was the Chinese player who went missing after accusing former Vice Premier Zhang Gaoli of sexual assault.

That’s the extent of it. The fact that he’s dabbling in protests without knowledge or passion might be the joke, but it’s unclear, and comes across as boasting about doing the bare minimum.

A routine about an autistic basketball player from his schooldays is more fully-formed, while the cornerstone segment about his obsession with Tram Boy, the teenager who stole a Melbourne tram almost 20 years ago, is much more promising. But ultimately Neal throws all sincerity away with a flippant callback to an opening routine, which itself only existed to foreshadow this moment.

Neal’s got some talent, but in his eager ambition to use his online success to pivot into being a comedian, he’s rushed out a festival debut way too soon. There are no shortcuts.

• Fergus Neal: Fergalicious is on at Trades Hall at 8pm until Saturday (no show Wednesday) and 7pm on Sunday.

Review date: 17 Apr 2023
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett
Reviewed at: Melbourne International Comedy Festival