Writing a show with Matt Okine

Between a morning radio slot and becoming a household name in stand-up, the Sydney-based comic still finds time to write new material.

During the week, Matt Okine’s day starts at 4.30am, when he begrudgingly gets up for his Triple J breakfast show that he co-hosts with Alex Dyson. “This has been my life for more than two years,” he says. The Brisbane-born, Sydney-based comic is speaking to Time Out ahead of his comedy festival circuit this year, which started in Brisbane in March and wraps up in Perth in May. “I do the day in two halves: first the radio show then the comedy gig at both ends of the day. Between 2pm to 5pm, I turn off everything, close all the windows and do my best to pretend that it’s nighttime to get some shut-eye. It’s hard to get my full eight hours, but I can’t do much more than that other than sticking glow-in-the-dark stars on the ceiling.”

Okine’s shows come together over time, piece by piece. He compares writing new jokes to making new acquaintances. “There are people you meet that you’re not sure about – they’re the kinds of jokes I’d write down to mull over later. Then there are people that you just fall head-over-heels for: these jokes are like catchy songs; I don’t need to write them down.” New material gets road-tested in the small club shows Okine does months before the festival circuit. If there is a risk of using up all the best stuff on radio, Okine has a solution to that. “This is the first time I’ve ever admitted it, but I have separate notes [for radio and stand-up shows]. My radio list has throwaway comments like: ‘Someone mistook me as the brown guy on the Subway ads.’”

Years of comedy club gigs have moulded Okine’s personal style of comedy. “I remember doing dark and angsty jokes, and lame one-liners, because I’d seen another comedian do it,” he says. “Over time, your work reflects who you are. Last year my show was inherently personal, because it was about a break-up. This time, I’m doing more observational-style work.”

Okine says testing out new material can be tough when the Twitterverse is so quick to slam a bad joke. Then there’s the creativity-killing capacity of memes. “They say video killed the radio star. I think memes kill the observational comedian.”

“Some jokes are like catchy songs. I don’t have to write them down” Did you know... Okine has a musical side project called Boilermakers, where he raps with long-time collaborator Dinnertime Duke