By Mario Pinti
Growing up in Germany, Aurelia St Clair could see the joy in making people laugh, even if that didn’t always impress her teachers.
“I was definitely good at talking, and talking my way out of trouble. Making jokes and getting people laughing,” she says.
The classroom has no doubt been an excellent training ground for many a comedian – after all, you know you’re going to get a reaction of some sort and some real-time feedback to go with it, much like at a comedy show – but a steely confidence is needed to pull it off.
“Well, I always thought I was funny,” Aurelia says, “but I know my jokes would have been irritating to some.”
Clearly, given her comedic output since 2018 when she first took to stand-up comedy, not many people are feeling irritated.
Stepping up to the mic for the first time at the 2018 Raw Comedy competitions Aurelia made it through to the Victorian state titles. She followed up that triumph, and others, with appearances at the last four Melbourne International Comedy Festivals.
“I have found that audiences are willing to come on board with a joke or a concept that I work through.”
Over this time, Aurelia has developed a nuanced understanding of audiences and, unsurprisingly, also grown to understand herself and her comedic work better.
“Going on stage, bombing and then getting back up gives you strength and a confidence in yourself. I’ve refined my joke writing process.”
Being of Cameroonian and German heritage, a person of colour, a relatively recent arrival to these shores, and gay, Aurelia has a keen sense of the challenges and travails of the outsider. For her this is something that she can draw on for her comedy lines.
“Like others I’ve had to adjust,” she says. And here she isn’t just talking about Melbourne CBD’s infamous hook turns or those intimidating red signs on our freeways shouting at hapless drivers to turn back; though she has a good giggle about these, too. Aurelia is talking about the importance of finding acceptance and belonging, and how difficult these can be for anyone not part of the social and cultural mainstream. Yet the challenges are not insurmountable: “I’m finding those things are slowly fading away. I’m feeling more that I belong here, and will remain here. I love it.”
Why we must continue to nurture inclusivity and diversity
So then, what is the purpose of Aurelia’s comedy?
“The outsider can see things differently, not just how things seem, and this perspective can be funny and new.”
It also can bring the insider and the outsider closer together: “Making people laugh, using humour, can connect people,” Aurelia says, “Community is important, connecting is important and comedy shows do that for people.”
Yet there are limits, Aurelia believes, to where comedy can go and how it does its work. Not everything is fair game for the comedian’s wit, particularly if they have not had the lived experience to give them the authentic voice to try a comedic take on a difficult topic.
“Comedy can disarm, take on serious topics in a light way,” she says.
“There is a universality with a lot of topics like living in a share house, and they can be joked about and do not harm or trigger people. But some things can be harmful for a group of people. I ask myself ‘would I laugh at this, is this funny or not?’ I try things and see where they land.”
Aurelia’s arrival on the comedy scene coincides with what can be described as an explosion in the number of people plying their wit as stand-up comedians. And she welcomes this. Social media, she says, has been good for stand-up comedy. An artist can, by publishing videos of their work for example, potentially reach a wider audience than they otherwise might.
Aurelia herself regularly dips into TickTok and streaming services to consume comedy for laughs and inspiration. And like many working comedians with a day job, she makes considerable use of social media forms herself, in particular the podcast, turning her comedic eye to dissect and understand the workings of pop culture.
Try out her latest series which carries the same title as her current live show, Non-Dairy Presenting. We chatted about this pod’s curious title, its exact meaning. It’s fair to say the commentary on life and love that you’ll get is not going to be the standard dairy white, homogenised and conventional- thought servings from mainstream social media influencers. The episodes go boldly into topics that would make a Boomer shudder: Is home ownership non-dairy presenting, a Jock to sweat under their collar: Is it OK to be a straight white man?, a Gen Xer to brood: Wife guys with my wife, and a Millennial paralysed with doubt: Curating mystery in the age of oversharing. All done with the drawing of a tarot card during each episode to bring an other-worldly dimension to the chatter and the laughs.
I wonder if she ever played that hand at school?
Aurelia St Clair is currently playing shows at Trades Hall until April 23 as part of the Melbourne
International Comedy Festival. There is an Auslan session April 22. Tickets can be purchased through: comedyfestival.com.au
