Out of the shadows
Top Kiwi comedian opens up about his dad’s suicide. By Rachel Thomas.
CORI Gonzalez-Macuer still gets night terrors over the scream his sister let out when he broke the news that their father was dead.
Gonzalez-Macuer, who is better known as a Billy T-awardwinning comedian, opened up about his father’s suicide in 2012 during a recent Tedx talk in Auckland.
Four years on, the comedian still wrestles with the day he found his father’s body.
With one per cent battery on his phone, he called the ambulance, his mother and his little sister in Australia to break the news.
‘‘It took probably two years before I was comfortable talking about it with anyone,’’ he said.
‘‘I’d get drunk and start talking to people about it.
‘‘Even my closest friends don’t really know what happened.’’
Doing the Tedx talk was difficult – he stressed about it for two months beforehand, but it’s something he felt he needed to share.
‘‘There’s something in my life that I’ve experienced that people could learn from, or could help people out.
‘‘No-one knows what the topic is, and I know people in the audience were expecting a comedy set.’’
His father died during the last stage of filming on Taika Waititi’s What We Do in the Shadows, in which Gonzalez-Macuer played a vampire.
He said talking about it, with any trusted person, was so important.
‘‘When I’ve been down it’s been ROBERT KITCHIN / FAIRFAX hard to tell people and I’d rather pretend it’s not there. But don’t be embarrassed about it, there’s nothing be ashamed of.’’
‘ It took probably two years before I was comfortable talking about it with anyone.’