Pax Assadi, Hayley Sproull and Rhys Mathewson join the first episode of the new season of Billy T' Billy. Photos / Supplied.
Comedians up and down the country are gearing up for the biggest event of the year.
The New Zealand International Comedy Festival kicks off next month, running for three weeks across Auckland and Wellington.
Over 150 performers from here and overseas are due to take part in the festival, amounting to over 600 live performances.
To kick things off, comedian and radio host Hayley Sproull is set to host the Comedy Gala in Auckland and Wellington.
For the first episode of the new season of Billy T’ Billy, the NZ Herald’s comedy podcast, Sproull sat down with former gala hosts, Rhys Mathewson and Pax Assadi, to talk about comedy’s biggest night.
Mathewson said it was like winning a championship in sport after he hosted.
“I remember the night afterwards, I couldn’t get to sleep. I was just so energised [by] all the work that I’ve been putting in has been leading to this, and I stayed up all night to the next by myself and found myself crying, watching the sunrise, being like, ‘I’ve made it’.”
For Assadi, he had a less moving reaction to his gig.
" I did the classic comedian thing of focusing on the gags that didn’t land and focusing on the people in the crowd that I could see that weren’t laughing — even though I know, objectively, I crushed.
“That’s the most annoying thing I could have done. But it’s also so quintessentially comedian.”
The festival comes at a changing time for comedy, with social media taking on a bigger role in pushing comedy — particularly TikTok, which has seen a trend towards audience interaction comedy.
At the other end, TV production has become more expensive, meaning fewer shows are being made and broadcast to a bigger audience.
Sproull said she is ready to dive all in on live performing but has seen the pressures take a toll on colleagues.
“I have a friend who’s been doing standup for very, many years, and they said to me, ‘I’m gonna start moving towards leaving and I’m feeling like I’m done’. And I was like, oh my God, I am at the other part of that, where I’m moving towards making this my entire identity.”
But that doesn’t mean Aotearoa is not delivering in the comedy stakes.
“New Zealand comedy has the most, has pound for pound the best comedy scene in the world,” Mathewson said.
“You give any other city where there are comedians the lack of stage time that New Zealanders have, they are putting out things one quarter as good as New Zealanders put out.
“What we do with what we have is incredible. It’s inventive. It’s diverse. It’s things that you would never even think of that you can go and see.”
Listen to the full episode for more insights into the comedy industry and the realities of hosting the Comedy Gala.
Billy T’ Billy is a NZ Herald podcast celebrating Kiwi comedy, in partnership with the New Zealand International Comedy Festival. New episodes are out every Wednesday.
The festival runs from May 2nd to May 25 in Auckland and Wellington.
You can follow the podcast at iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Flintoff suffered serious facial injuries and broken ribs while filming in 2022.