Trust in the funny!
Nazeem Hussain’s brand new show
Come the revolution, when diversity is a given and not a special effort, when common sense prevails, and wrongs are set right, Nazeem Hussain will be happy to take a little edge off his comedy and go for a few more dad bits than mad bits. Until then, the creator and star of Orange is the New Brown will deliver sharp barbs with glee in Hussain That?, his sixth solo stand-up show, premiering at Adelaide Fringe on February 24.
“I’m still having the same conversations with people where they’re like, ‘Oh, but you know, we’re still moving in the right direction,’” Hussain, 33, says with a hint of perplexity about the entertainment industry’s slow crawl towards inclusion. “I’ve been hearing that since I started comedy over a decade ago. But how long until we’re actually doing what we’re saying we’re moving towards and just get it done?”
With a chuckle, Hussain adds, “It’s not like you’re building a house where you have to wait for a stage one, stage two permit. Just do it! I don’t understand why there’s such friggin’ inertia. Just hire people that look like Australians and put them on screen. I’ve met so many brown and black and Asian actors who are just like, ‘I’m just waiting to be hired.’ It’s not like we don’t exist.”
On a roll, Hussain calls out medical dramas as an obvious place to cast “bravely or more accurately” on television. “Get some black and brown doctors in there,” he quips,”because otherwise, people aren’t going to trust it’s a hospital!”
For Sri Lankan-born Hussain, who emigrated with his mum and sisters to Melbourne as a child and used humour as a shield against bullies, becoming a dad has added urgency to his comic delivery.
“Most of my show this year is framed around the idea of, ‘How do you explain the world to your kid?’” he says of his son, Eesa, who turns 2 in April. “You can lie to them, but then at some point you’ve got to give them answers.”
Eesa has no trouble serving as a source of inspiration for his dad, alongside politics and social encounters. “He already does things to make himself laugh,” Hussain says. “I’m just like, ‘Oh, man, this is, this is my fault.’ But you know, I find if someone’s not funny, I kind of find it hard to trust them, so at least I’m not going to have trust issues with him!”
Fans, though, have trusted Hussain’s clear authority on the daily indignities of life since he and his pal Aamer Rahman won Best Newcomer at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival in 2008.
Not only has Hussain gone on to sell out comedy clubs and produce award-winning TV series like Legally Brown, he’s also reached international audiences via Netflix as a correspondent on Bill Nye Saves the World and his 2017 special Nazeem Hussain: Public Frenemy. “I thought I’d run out of jokes after my first show and, ‘Oh, that’s it, I’ve said all the funny things that I have in my brain,’” he admits with candour. “But it’s sort of like a muscle. The more comedy you do, the more comedy you see.”
Hussain is in constant prep mode, even writing observations on his hand if his phone battery dies, or saying things to himself in the shower and trying not to forget them by the time he’s out.
“When people troll me online, or they mistake me for someone else or I’ve just been ripped off or I’ve just gotten a fine on public transport or someone’s taken a selfie with me in a really weird place, it all makes it into the show,” Hussain says. “Something really annoying will happen to you and you’re like, ‘Oh that p--ses me off, but luckily, I’ve got comedy!’ I can turn it into something really fun.”
“The more comedy you do, the more you see”