A trio of Kiwi comic kings are putting on a show they hope will help people forget about the cost of living crisis for a while, at Queenstown’s SkyCity Casino tomorrow night.
SkyCity regular Paul Douglas (pictured) will MC the sold-out event that features headline acts Dai Henwood and Cori Gonzalez-Macuer, at one of his favourite venues.
‘‘We’re pumped up to get down there, man, it’s one of the best rooms in the country, if not the world,’’ Douglas says.
‘‘There’s something weird about it, when you turn up there you almost think it wouldn’t work … [but you’ve] got the crowd wrapped around you, it’s such a good room.
‘‘We can’t wait to… show people a good time and forget about their bills for a minute.’’
Douglas will certainly be match-fit, having just played six shows in Sydney over five days when Mountain Scene caught up with him.
He says it’ll be a “nice, tight show”.
“I’ll do a 20 to 25-minute intro, bring Cori on he’ll do 20 to 25, we’ll have a break, I’ll come back and do 10 to 15 and Dai will do about 35 to 40 to close it out.”
The three comics complement each other, he says.
‘‘I’m a bit sort of dirtier, and Cori’s real deadpan and has really hard-hitting, quick jokes, and then you’ve got this energy of Dai at the end.’’
Henwood’s been open and honest about his ongoing battle with cancer and has just endured another bout of intensive treatment for the disease.
Douglas says he still pinches himself to be knocking about the country with “such a legend”.
“He’s 100% one of the reasons why I got into comedy.
“Dai is so thirsty to be gigging at the moment … it’s pretty incredible really, he talks about it [cancer] … he can’t wait, eh, he’s just loving performing.
‘‘He and I did two sold-out shows in Taupō the other week, just the response he’s getting, I think it’s going to be a real cultural line in the sand, it’s going to be one of the first times such a universally-loved Kiwi has come out publicly with something like this.
“His attitude is unreal, mate, once you see it you’ll be blown away.”
Headline act: Dai Henwood
Douglas likes to take the opportunity as MC “facilitating the acts” to try out new material he’s been working on.
Expect ram-raids to be a topic he’ll rip into tomorrow after the number plates were recently stolen from his “Nissan nana mobile” at his Auckland home and attached to a car that ram-raided a shop.
His replacement plates, that he used anti-tamper screws to put on, are appropriate.
“There’s no secret that I like to smoke the odd bit of weed … the new ones [plates] I was randomly assigned … was PUF and then 416, four numbers away from 420 [slang for marijuana], if I’d just waited one more hour …”
