Comedian Patrick Marlborough has their gloves on, ready to examine the ethically dubious intersection of the Australian arts and mining sectors, all while benefiting from it. With Fringe stating that performers are not to disparage any of its sponsors, funding bodies and affiliated organisations, Patrick has begun a modern-day David vs. Goliath, asking whether the artist can truly share a stage with a particular mining giant without seriously compromising the integrity of their art, through a combination of stand-up, lecture, and PowerPoint presentation.

Patrick Marlborough is a nonbinary writer, comedian, journalist, critic and musician based in Fremantle, WA. They have words in VICE, Rolling Stone, The Guardian, Junkee, Noisey, Meanjin, Crikey, The Lifted Brow, Cordite, Going Down Swinging, The Betoota Advocate, and "beloved other." They are a mental health and disability advocate, writing about their experiences with depression, suicide, bipolar, high functioning autism, and OCD.

We spoke with Patrick about their upcoming show:

ISOLATED NATION: You mentioned on your show description that “Burlesque, Improv and Fracking” are the cornerstones of Australian Culture. Can we expect all three of these things in your upcoming show?

PATRICK: In a sense. Though, my show sits more at the cul-de-sac of Australian culture, in one of those outer suburbs where you drive round and round and round for 53 minutes trying to find the McMansion of some dude from gumtree who is selling you the complete series of Water Rats on VHS.

It looks like your show is going to be in the format of a TED Talk. What are some of your favourite TED Talks, and why? 

I sometimes confuse TED Talks with those rambling videos Bin Laden used to put out.  I have always seen TED as a self-perpetuating bukake party of middlebrow platitudes, where self-appointed experts prattle off two-thirds of a Wikipedia article they read and use an apocryphal Helen Keller quote to spruik their latest stab at venture capitalism. It is very bleak and thus very very funny to me. 

How would you describe your comedic style? Who are your influences?

I would describe my comedic style as “60mg of Vyvanse and a mistaken belief that Bugs Bunny is real and is my friend.” My biggest influences are the Unabomber and that clip of Mark Latham falling off his chair. 

What is your favourite Tim and Eric sketch (and why?) 

Hard to say! I think my favourite thing Tim and Eric ever did together (other than all of Tom Goes to the Mayor) were the demented promotional videos they made for Shrek the Third. You could say that had a massive influence on On Fringe…

How many stand-up gigs have you done so far? What was your favourite show in recent memory, and why?

I have been performing standup for 7 years and tend to write a new 5 to 10 minutes each time I perform and while living in New York I was sometimes performing 2 to 3 times a night and as such managed to permanently fracture my brain and memory leaving my mind smooth and clean as a goose egg. 

My favourite memory of a show was the time a child psychologist came up to me after a set, gave me her card, and said she’d be more than happy to help my 12 year old son (not real) who I’d said had attended Book Week as Abubakar Shekau, the head of Boko Haram (real). 

Is there a way you can tell a “good” audience from a “bad” one?  

For me, performing my brand of comedy in Perth is kinda like racking up to a children’s oncology ward to sell super funds. 

I remember performing at the Flying Scotsman the night after Trump won and seeing that the dude in the front row was a skinhead with a swastika tattooed on his neck and thinking “hmm, something tells me he’s not going to like my set about fascist Care Bears.” 

My dream audience would be Lord Mayor Basil Zempilas. Come to my show Basil, you limpdick. 

What has been your favourite venue to perform in, and why?

It’s hard not to enjoy Fringe venues with names like “The Woodside Frackatorium” and “LOLocene, by Woodside.”  One time I got held up at gunpoint by a group of 12 year olds in New Orleans, and I spent a manic half hour riffing as they (kindly) walked me to a bus stop and (very kindly) paid my bus fair (I had no money, too bad for them). The streets of the Lower 9th Ward remain my favourite venue to this day, tbh.  

What are some of the topics you’ll be covering on your show? 

My crippling YoGo addiction, Mick Molloy’s pleasure cruise, feuding with the iiNet guy, lesbians in Frasier, greedy ungrateful firemen, Tank Man, my bounty of big and beautiful sons…

I guess, for the most part, I am talking about my 13 year career in the arts and how late capitalism and festivals such as Fringe World have made artists unwilling collaborators in an exploitative system that devalues art, promotes mediocrity, and rings out the death knell of true creative expression and ingenuity for the sake of “content.”

Oh, and Shrek. A lot of Shrek. 

What do you hope audiences will take away from your show?

Anything but the dreaded novel coronavirus, COVID-19. 

What other projects are you working on?

I just learned that I’m the new president of Collingwood Football Club, which should be a breeze.

To be honest, Covid set all my projects back a year and kinda decimated all my main sources of income as a writer.  I finished a novel last year that no one will like which I’m currently shipping to rightfully indifferent literary agents and publishers. I’m also putting (what I hope to be) the final touches on the long-delayed debut Bang Bang Bart album, which I’m hoping to get out there in the next few months, Shrek willing. 

Last year, I put out one episode of a podcast about Rove living in exile on a barge in the ocean, trying to recreate his old show while being hunted by the feds for some unnamed war crime. You can listen to it here. 

Other than that, I’m thinking of retiring on my Guardian money ($310 AUD) and investing in a Krazy Teez franchise. Are they still a thing??

Suffice to say, we have more questions than answers, and we hope to find them by seeing Patrick’s show “On Fringe” at the Rubix Bar, on either Friday the 12th or Saturday the 13th of February.

Tickets available here.