Andy Curtain and Storm Xu, better known as comedy duo Kung Fu Komedy, are invited to perform for this year's Melbourne International Comedy Festival with a show called "Life In China," which focuses on telling the story of their bizarre crodd-cultural lives.
Andy: "You are funny but where is the Kungfu?"
Melbourne-born Andy Curtain speaks excellent Mandarin now, both on and off the stage, but when he first moved to China eight years ago, he could barely speak a word of Chinese.
Reflecting on his decision to leave Australia, he said that he was so bored of the young life back then, "I thought I would be wasting it if I didn't."
With Law and Engineering degrees, Andy managed to find a job in arguably China's most fascinating city - Shanghai, but it didn't take long for the grueling office hours to take their toll. He started to feel that something's been missing from life, "everyday I only use one side of my brain."
"Shanghai is big city, but not much fun besides dining and drinking at bars."
"I found some friends, funny friends so we can do some comedy. There was no particular goals that I thought we could just spend some fun time together. "
Andy asked an owner of a small bar if he could share one hour from their regular live music time, as a return Andy and his comedy group would invite friends coming to buy drinks so the bar can make money.
"Our first performance was a very small show. As we were quite embarrassed we didn't even invite our friends. So just eight of us."
The stand-up comedy was conducted in English as most of their friends as well as audiences are foreigners in Shanghai.
Gradually, they started building audiences with people asking when their next show would be. Soon their monthly,show become fortnightly even weekly show.
Talking about the name "Kung fu Komedy", Andy laughed:
"I was told once, 'yes you are funny but where is the kungfu?"
Watch Andy perform below:
Storm: I admire the freedom of Stand-up Comedy
Born in Shanghai, Storm Xu spent three years at TAFE in Melbourne as an international student to study auto-mechanics before moving back to his hometown five years ago.
Being a comedy fan since childhood, watching English language stand-up comedy entertained Storm while he was living in Australia.
Two months after moving back to Shanghai, Storm found Andy online, who was recruiting for his comedy club.
Since then, he has trained himself diligently on and off the stage, and found inspirations everywhere in life.
"I was probably not a hardworking student at school," says Xu. "But coming to comedy, my mind can't stop 24/7. I could even wake up in the middle of sleep just to write down my ideas."
"All original content. That's the spirit!"
"Say what you want to say. This is the life attitude I aspire to."
As to whether he really has the freedom to say whatever he wants to say to audiences in China, Storm, who was praised as "one of the brightest stand-up talents in China" by The Age, said: "from my experience I think I can."
He adds as a caveat though, "Probably what I said is not necessarily political."
Storm explains, "How far you can go in your performance, I think it depends on the media context of country you perform, as well as your audience."
"If they like you and laugh in the first 10 minutes, they shall enjoy the more intense or critical topics or more personal opinions you express in last 5 minutes.
"I don't go straight into it. I have to lay foundations and pave to it."
Watch Storm perform below:
Finding a place for stand-up comedy In ChinaImage
For Storm, this is his second time being invited to perform at Melbourne International Comedy Festival. This is the first time however that he and Andy have performed as a pair for the festival.
They said their show is not necessarily all about China, but anything about life.
"We've found local content is funny, but if you are in another country, people don't know what you are talking about." Andy says.
Talking about increasing popularity of comedy shows on Chinese TV, Storm noted it as an entertainment trend, but emphasis that live stand-up comedy provides different experience, "closer and more engaging".
"Everyone loves laughing. I also write scripts for them (TV comedy). How we compete with them? We are not on the same platform. "
He added that for Kung fu Komedy, their focus is to increase quality of live shows, as more words of mouth will bring more audience.
Andy added that the main difference beween Xiang Sheng, or "Crosstalk" (a traditional art format of stand-up comedy that Chinese audience are more familiar with), and live stand-up comedy as Assie audiences know it, is improvising.
"Everyday you may say different things on the stage. For TV programs you need to submit your content. But when you go live on stage, you communicate with audience."
Find out more about "Storm Xu & Andy Curtain Life In China" at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival Official Website.
