COMEDIAN Joel Ozborn has come a long way since contorting his body through the Sydney Harbour Bridge’s younger and much smaller cousin.
Yes, he used to bend and twist his way through a garden-variety coathanger for a laugh at Circular Quay.
It was here that he got his first big break, winning the Street Performer of the Year competition in 1998.
‘‘The first time I performed inside the Opera House I was doing a show with Akmal Saleh,’’ Ozborn said.
‘‘I remember telling the audience that it was only 30metres away, outside the wall, that I used to perform.’’
Ozborn’s talent for spinning a good yarn was first recognised when he won a public-speaking competition at high school.
‘‘I used to like to perform but most kids do, we’re all vying for attention,’’ he said.
‘‘I was never the class clown or anything at school, I was more like the class clown’s apprentice, waiting in the wings.
‘‘With the school public-speaking competition, I tailored my speech towards what was most likely to get laughs. Dedicated debating people came up to me and they were like, ‘that wasn’t a proper speech, there was no structure to that’.’’
Ozborn loved comedy movies from a young age, and was particularly amused and inspired by Bill Murray.
‘‘I could watch him in anything from Caddyshack to Stripes and Ghostbusters, and I was always fascinated by his ability,’’ he said.
‘‘When I was 12 my dad took me to see this American comedian/musician, The Amazing Johnathan, in Sydney. He came out and destroyed the audience, it was the most hilarious thing I had ever seen.
‘‘Years later I worked with him. It’s funny how things work out.’’
Ozborn honed his skills at Circular Quay as a street performer.
‘‘I would do stuff that had a premise of magic, but there was never any magic in there, it was just an excuse to get a laugh,’’ he said.
‘‘I started out by putting myself through a coathanger, and I literally grew out of that. Then I moved to Venice Beach [California] and changed my act a bit.’’
Ozborn said he had to get ‘‘out there, get crazy’’ to make his mark on the notoriously cut-throat strip.
‘‘The audiences you are performing for at Venice Beach are people with pythons around their necks; people covered with tattoos; bikers and hippies ... it’s such a melting pot of absurdity. I was used to doing Circular Quay where there’s tourists and families and suddenly I’m at Venice Beach and there’s freaks everywhere. I had to up the ante, get a bit more extreme,’’ he said.
When it comes to working on material for his stand-up shows, Ozborn says the key word is discipline. Not an easy task for comedians, he says, because they are inherently lazy – and have no qualms admitting it.
‘‘Arj [Barker] is really prolific and churns out a lot of material but says he’s lazy. And you read interviews about Eddie Izzard and he talks about being lazy. You’ve just got to keep on yourself to keep it coming.’’
When asked if he had to hide potential stand-up material from his best mates, Barker and Saleh, with whom he toured for most of 2011, Ozborn laughed.
‘‘We’ll throw ideas around but sometimes when we arrive at a town, we’ll see something and claim it. It’s like ‘OK, you got the prawn, and when we get to Taree I get the giant clam’.’’
Hecklers remain a thorn in the side of most stand-up comedians, Ozborn included, but he takes them in his stride.
‘‘Hecklers don’t usually realise that this is what we do for a living, so the odds are against them if they want to have a go at us,’’ he said.
‘‘Here’s a little secret, between you and me: what you do with a heckler is, you let them say a few things, because if you go at them too hard straight off the bat, the audience is going to go ‘woah, hang on, that guy was just mucking around’. But if you let them go a bit, the audience gets the shits with them and will be on your side.’’
The 33-year-old uses Balmain as a base but refers to it as his ‘‘elaborate storage space’’ due to his ‘‘nomadic, gypsy lifestyle’’.
He is often mistaken for Aussie actor Eric Bana but just can’t see the resemblance.
‘‘I get it all the time. The other night after a gig this guy comes up to me and is like, ‘were you in the movie Troy?’ I thought ‘didn’t you just see me on stage as Joel Ozborn for the past hour?’.’’
Ozborn is looking forward to returning to Newcastle this month.
‘‘There will be stand-up but I’m also putting my old street act back into the show,’’ he said.
‘‘The idea is to transfer the audience back to Venice Beach. I’ll be interacting with people walking by, and playing all the characters. It will be a one-man Venice Beach re-creation.’’
Joel Ozborn will perform at The Playhouse, Civic Theatre, on Saturday, February 25. Bookings on 49491977 or at ticketek.com.au.
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