Jason Bryne

Jason Bryne  is fucking mental. There’s no denying that. And he won’t deny it either. While burning his pasty Irish skin in the mid-morning sun at Bondi Beach, the man talks to SIAN GAMMIE about his unique brand of comedy, how he dragged his balls in half and the importance of having a nice jacket…

Jason Bryne How did you come to call the show “Cirque De Byrne”?
The show I’m doing is very physical. See, the thing with me is that I like naming shows and then I don’t really know what to put in them. The reason I like Cirque De Byrne is cause all my shows are like a fucking night out anyway. It’s not just stand-up. And then I did a show where I got this really cool jacket.

The red one?
Did you see that?

Yeah I did see that…
Yeah! And I went “fuck that looks cool”. And then I got the hat and I thought “shit I’ve gotta do a show like that, that’d be grand.”

So we’ve got a lovely big velvet curtain at the back and a festoon light. And make it all feel burlesquey. And we have burlesque girls and freaks.

Freaks?
Yeah we’ve got freaks, real circus freaks.

And you’ve got the jacket. And the hat.
Yes! And we also have skippers. Step aerobics and skippers. And I manage to get my whole body into a pair spanks.

Does it ever just go really wrong when you get someone out of the audience?
No because as I say they trust me, like I’m doing one thing, with the skipping where I actually got a mic lead and there was a woman just standing there and I actually just went whack in her face.

Oh yeah, and I split a guy’s head open with the microphone here one time…

Jason Byrne is touring with Cirque De Byrne around Australia as part of the Melbourne International Comedy Festival.

Catch him damaging himself in Melbourne from March 29th, Perth in late April and Sydney early May. He asks if you could please bring him a present. No, really.