SA comedian Tumi Morake wants to laugh all the way to the bank

Bloemfontein-born comedian Tumi Morake has had a busy week in New York, where she launched a new TV show and performed in the city’s famed Broadway theatre district.

Morake, with comedians Aditi Mittal from India and Liza Treyger from the US, launched The World According to Comedians in Manhattan on Monday. On Tuesday they performed at Caroline’s on Broadway, a comedy club near Times Square that has hosted names as big as Jerry Seinfeld, Billy Crystal and Rosie O’donnell.

Morake lives in Atlanta with her husband and three children. They moved there six months ago. “We are following the American dream,” she said. “My dream is to amass wealth and then go back home and buy a farm. I want to go back to Bloemfontein and have a project to develop women in comedy. We are not abandoning anything. You just need to step out so you can appreciate where you are from.”

Back home in SA, Morake is on Mzansi Magic, presenting 10-week talk show Sunday Sexy Love. It focuses on celebrity couples and their relationships.

The World According to Comedians is a six-part reality TV show that unpacks why Finland has been named the happiest country by the UN World Happiness Report for five consecutive years. It will air on Finnish national TV from December 2 and its producers plan global distribution.

While Morake earns a living making people laugh, her trip to the US has been no joke. “We agreed our children must know that we are brave and that we believe in our dreams.

“When we first came here it was Black Lives Matter, George Floyd and the storming of the Capitol,” she recalls.

“You have to be prepared to deal with certain things.”

She has been “spotted a few times” by people who saw Seriously Single, a Netflix film she starred in.

“I have worked hard for that,” she says. “I’m glad that back home I worked hard.

“I didn’t just get discovered and then sit back. We have a good work ethic. I know I will have a breakout success here.” —