Behind the smiles
Comic Urzila Carlson’s new book reveals the tough road she took from domestic abuse and grinding poverty in South Africa to enough fame to jump airport queues. Interview by Eleanor Black.
Urzila Carlson grabs opportunities with both hands – she is not a woman who will die wondering. She ‘‘reads the signs’’, not in a wafty, touchy-feely, navel-gazing way, but in the way of someone who grew up in a racial war zone and is alert to nuance. If a chance presents itself, she takes it.
That is why the 40-year-old South African comic emigrated to New Zealand 10 years ago, after realising that if she wanted to raise a family in a peaceful environment, she had to move. An armed robbery at her workplace and an attempted burglary at her home turned her growing sense of unease into a strong urge to flee.
She spotted an ad for New Zealand, then found two DVDs in the ‘‘prize cupboard’’ at the newspaper where she worked as production manager: Whale Rider, and promotional footage from Tourism New Zealand.
The ad asked, ‘‘Why not New Zealand?’’
‘‘And I couldn’t think of one reason why not,’’ Carlson says, nestled in a bucket seat at her local Columbus coffee, a few blocks from the West Auckland home she shares with her wife Julie, their 3-year-old daughter, and their 10-week-old son.
Three months later she was here: jobless, homeless, with just enough money to get by until she found work at an advertising firm.
Reading the signs is also how Carlson got into comedy, following through on a workmate’s dare to try an open-mic night, impressing the organisers with the polish of her debut performance, and discovering that making people laugh was actually ‘‘the best job in the world’’. Within three years of launching her comedy career, she was appearing on 7 Days.
‘‘People trust me with their laughter,’’ she says, clearly delighted. ‘‘It’s like magic. You say something, they laugh.’’
And grabbing opportunities is how she ended up writing a book about her life, Rolling With the Punchlines, which is quite a bit less funny and a lot more heartfelt than you might imagine.
The publishers, Allen and Unwin, came to her with the idea, and Carlson reasoned that writing a book wouldn’t be that radically different from writing a comedy show, for which she always has notes in her bag. She was dead wrong, she laughs. ‘‘There will only ever be one book,’’ she writes in the epilogue, ‘‘because this one has been a hell of a process and I’m not convinced I’m enjoying it.’’
Besides the hard work of wrestling with slippery ropes of words for days at a time, Carlson found some of the subject matter tough to revisit. She ploughed on because she felt there was value in sharing her struggles.
Carlson is a big believer in talking about hard times, to help others going through hard times.
‘‘I didn’t want to write a book people would learn nothing from. If people want to know me better, that is it,’’ she says, pointing at a copy of her book. On the vivid yellow cover she grins in a Rosie the Riveter pose.
One of three children, Carlson says she had a happy childhood, but it was marred by her alcoholic father’s abusive behaviour. They fled his violence when Carlson was 8.
Her mother (‘‘She’s a strong b…., that woman, let me tell you’’) moved the kids to Benoni, a city half an hour outside of Johannesburg, best known for being the former home of Charlize Theron, and for its plentiful ‘‘mine dumps’’, giant piles of powdery waste material left at the top of mine shafts.
These dangerous sites were favourite playgrounds for the children, who
‘People trust me with their laughter. It’s like magic. You say something, they laugh.’ Urzila Carlson
would surf down the sides and create jumps for their bikes.
‘‘We were really poor,’’ says Carlson, who remembers spending evenings sitting on a blanket on the front lawn telling stories, because they didn’t have a television. ‘‘That storytelling thing was activated young because there was nothing else to do.’’
She says she has no animosity towards her father, who died earlier this year. ‘‘Abuse is a community issue. He gave what he got [growing up]. I think we need to support each other more. We need to be more community-minded.’’
In the book she also shares the grief that submerged her and Julie when they lost a pregnancy after their first child was born. ‘‘When I started talking about it I realised how common it is, but people don’t talk,’’ she says.
This low period came not long after their dear friend Ewen Gilmour died at age 51, weeks before he was to conduct their wedding.
A great support to fledgling comics, the famed Westie was a frequent visitor to Carlson’s home, just down the road from his mother’s place. Gilmour came for dinner each Thursday night, before hosting a pub quiz.
It was an easy friendship. Gilmour would turn up with a bag of steaks, asking if there was beer in the fridge.
A much-loved figure in West Auckland, where he was a city councillor, he always had time for people, says Carlson.
‘‘He would never be s... with fans and I think that is one of the most