The funny side of country WA

After a rural tour of WA that’s traversed cane fields in Kununurra and red dirt plains in Kalgoorlie, Melbourne International Comedy Festival Roadshow stars Tegan Higginbotham, Rhys Nicholson and Elbowskin’s Ernie Austin and David Adams are relieved to be in Perth.

From Broome to Esperance and Karratha to Margaret River, the comedians have seen almost every corner of the State and now they’re ready for the comforts of a capital city ahead of their season at His Majesty’s Theatre, which starts tonight.

“We’ve done some outdoor gigs — one up in Kununurra out in the bush with bugs flying into your mouth while trying to perform, so we’ve been looking forward to a proper theatre,” Austin toldAAA .

Nicholson added: “People think we’re doing drugs and stuff but we just need our washing done.”

For Higginbotham, 27, who was born and raised in Melbourne, travelling around the State with the show has been eye-opening: “You know Australia is big but then you travel around WA and you go ‘Geez, Australia is really, really big’.”

While Higginbotham was pleased to discover regional audiences proved fairly receptive to her material, Elbowskin weren’t so lucky. While their song about beer always went down a treat, a tune about marriage equality didn’t fare so well in Port Hedland.

“It was met with silence; it went down like a lead balloon,” Adams said with a laugh. “We were having a really good gig until then ... they were just like ‘Nah’.

“I guess they’ve got to put those people somewhere and Port Hedland is where they’ve put them.”