Interview
Ray O’Leary created the ‘Bean Korma’
We get stuck in a lift with the ill-fitted suit-wearing New Zealander, in the midst of his first ever UK tour
For some comedians, each passing tour comes with its own identity; a running theme, a profound overarching message, or a means to tap into the zeitgeist of the moment. But for the deadpan performer Ray O’Leary, it’s much more straight-forward.
“It’s mostly an hour of me telling my favourite jokes from that year,” he explained. “I guess there’s a little bit about me, introducing myself to the audience and whatnot, but it’s largely a collection of my favourite gags and good jokes from that year.”
The show in question is titled Your Laughter Is Just Making Me Stronger, and this marks the very first foray into the British comedy scene, with his first UK tour, which is currently ongoing. The New Zealander explain that for him, playing over here was always a major ambition.
“The UK is almost held up like a comedy Mecca to New Zealand, so much of our comedy comes from the UK and so much of our comedy styling does. We are constantly inundated with Live At The Apollo and all the great British comedy shows, so it’s always something I’ve wanted to do.”
Standing tall, in a now distinctive, grey, ill-fitted suit, O’Leary’s show consists of a collection of observational gags, spiked with a healthy dose of surrealism. His joke-writing process? Well, he messages himself.
“When I have thoughts, I will Facebook message them to myself, so there’s this incredibly narcissistic message chain to myself. They make me look like a madman,” he said.
But a strong madman at that, especially since our laughter is making him stronger. But what we want to know, is what he would do with all this newfound strength?
“The moral thing to do, would be to get on an exercise bike and generate electricity for a city,” he continued. “But I think I’d probably be doing lots of feats of strength to impress my friends. Lift a car up over my head, maybe try squeezing a can of spinach and eat it all in one go, like Popeye. Anything to impress my friends.”
But first he must impress us, and where better time to get to know the man, than stuck in a lift, as we dig a little deeper into the mind of this rising comedy star.
Who would you most like to be stuck in a lift with?
The first thought that jumps to mind is Bear Grylls. You’d normally pick him when stuck in survival situations, so I don’t know if he would be as handy in a lift, I don’t think there would be any animals to hunt, or if we’d ever need to start a fire, but I’d be with him for survivability.
Who would you least like to be stuck in a lift with?
Someone who comes up to me and is standing too close, and is just talking at me non-stop about what is going on in their life, trying to make me think they’re impressive, while at the same time there is another conversation going on in the other corner in the lift, and they look like they’re having a really good time. That would be my nightmare scenario I think.
What’s the weirdest interaction you’ve ever had with a famous person?
Oh god, oh no. There was a beloved New Zealand TV entertainer and I did an interview with her and I asked her a bunch of silly questions. She was on a reality TV show at the time, and I asked what the perfect cast would be, and I suggested my own, and as part of that I suggested David Bain, who is most known for being accused of murdering his entire family. That really upset her, and while I think she did laugh, she was also crying inside. My director had to step in and calm them down, and that was my first foray into TV. I learnt where the line is and what you can joke about, with who.
What was the last gig or show you went to?
I’ve been meaning to go and see something in the West End since I’ve been here. But I last went to see a friend do a show about the history of western Australia via songs. It was a bunch of songs they had written about the history of western Australia. It was quite nice.
What’s on your rider?
A gun in case the crew step out of line. No, it’s hard to know what you can get away with. You hear stories of people who want M&M’s but all the blues ones removed or whatever, but as a New Zealander you’re sort of pulled back from demanding too much because you feel guilty, so a real rider would be some Pepsi Max Vanilla and some Oreos.
What did the 12-year-old you imagine you’d be doing now?
That age was around the time I saw my very first stand-up comedy special. That’s when the dream first emerged, before I suppressed it. I wanted to become an author. I was reading a lot then, I was a booky nerdy kid. I was hoping I’d be a literate, a playwright, a man of culture. The oath that has now emerged would be nothing but a huge disappointment,
I bet you’d be pleased you were wearing a suit though.
Yeah, that’s true, he was easily impressed. I could’ve fooled him, the job must be good, I’m wearing a suit.
What’s the worst advice you’ve ever been given?
Quit your job to become an Instagram model, that’s up there. I used to live near a doctor who lived round the corner from us and I remember my mum saying, look at him, he’s worked hard his whole life and now he can enjoy his retirement and do what he wants and I remember thinking – I don’t want to work hard my whole life just so the only part of my life I can enjoy is when I am tired, decrepit and old, that sounds like a horrible nightmare. That helped me inspire me to become a comedian, because it was a much better work/life balance.
What film have you rewatched the most times?
It’s embarrassing but I think the film I have seen the most in my life is The Room, which is the notoriously bad film they have public screenings of, which I have been to a few times. It is a masterpiece. The Room is the best film to have nailed being so bad its good, it’s a triumph in disaster.
Have you got a favourite moment in The Room? Mine is the alarm going off at 00:28 and he gets up and just starts his day.
He voice records his girlfriend and his best friend talking and he plays the recording back and the conversation is not at all the conversation they just had. Or maybe it’s when his mother-in-law says she has breast cancer, and it’s never brought up again. She just has it for some reason, there’s no point to it. There’s also a scene when the girlfriend comes in and the other character says ‘what are you doing, look at the candles and the sexy red dress’ and there are no candles, and she’s not wearing a red dress. But Tommy Wiseau is genuinely an auteur, he had such a singular vision.
What is your most controversial food opinion?
I don’t know if it’s opinion but more a food behaviour, but one of the many controversial things I’ve done with food, is I used to eat the same meal every day which I called a ‘Bean Korma’, and my friends were disgusted by it. It was white rice, frozen mixed vegetables, and baked beans, all mixed together. I called it a ‘Bean Korma’ which really made my friends mad because it wasn’t a korma, but I thought, if it’s not a Bean Korma, why does everyone call it a Bean Korma?
That’s pretty bad.
There’s no way to sugar coat it. It was at Uni I was doing this, and I saw the doctor to make sure if it was okay to eat it, and the doctor was like, the baked beans are a superfood so I was like, I guess this is the perfect thing to eat.
What’s the worst job you’ve ever had?
My mum and her partner at the time used to operate a tourism business which would require people to leave their cars in the middle of nowhere and there were reports of car thieves in the area, so as a young teenage boy it was my job to wait in the car park, so if a thief showed up, I was to beg with them to please not steal a car. I don’t know what I was going to do, I was 15-year-old boy just left abandoned with these roving, marauding gangs of car thieves.
Did you ever actually have to confront any potential thieves?
No, which is maybe the worst thing because then it felt like the job was pointless. At least if I had a bust up maybe then it would’ve made sense for me to be out there. I got so bored, I read every book in the house because I had nothing to do, and one of the few books left was the Bible so I started reading it, and it’s just a terrible read, it doesn’t roll off the page the same way Harry Potter does.
What’s the skill that nobody else knows that you’re great at?
I don’t know if you’d consider it a skill, but if I hear a song, I can often pinpoint to what season it appeared in Glee and on some occasions, the precise episode and why they sung it. It obviously comes in handy quite a lot, mostly to bring conversations to a grinding standstill.
Do you have any superstitions?
I do wear the suit, so I guess I am wearing lucky clothes. There’s advice I saw recently and it’s something I never considered, is having a go on and go off stage ritual, which I guess some people use to calm themselves down or centre themselves. My strategy has always been this: the audience response to me is out of my control, I’ve done all I can to make the jokes work, so it’s up to that particular audience to see if they like it or not. The only thing I can control is whether or not I remember what I’m about to say. So, I tend to pace back and forth in the green room and recite my set list over to myself over and over.
Do you still get nervous before shows?
Every time. But I think being nervous shows you care, which is a good thing. There are some ways not being nervous would be good, the way people talk about Norm Macdonald they make it sound like he almost had a fearlessness about him which made him unpredictable, which would’ve been nice to emulate but no I get nervous all the time.
For what it’s worth, I bet Norm Macdonald would’ve got nervous too.
Yeah, I bet he was a real chicken!
Ray O’Leary is on tour around the UK now, with dates running until 16 February. Find tickets here
