How Charlie Pickering would sell Peter Dutton

Charlie Pickering hosts The Weekly, a satirical news show on the ABC. I chatted with him on Wednesday.

Fitz: Thanks for your time, Charlie. As a sometime biographer, I love seminal moments in a life. Was there one which sent you down the path of comedy?

CP: Yes. I was about 10, at St Leonards College Primary School in Brighton, and my teacher said: “Charlie, you’ve just got to behave yourself. Look, you’re funny, but …”

“Really? You think I’m funny?”

“Yes, you’re very Monty Python …”

I didn’t know what that meant, so Mum got me the Life of Brian on video, and the rest is history. I had no idea that was an option, there was a thing that existed in the world that you could be that funny.

Fitz: Which brings us to the seminal moment I know of. A bit over a decade later, with a law degree under your belt, you complete your first week’s work at the reputable if snooty legal firm of Blake, Dawson, Waldron and …

Charlie Pickering.

CP: And while I started the week aspiring to one day be in the corner office, and turned up every day early and went home every day late, I also spent a lot of time looking at the blokes – and they were all blokes – who had those corner offices. They were always there earlier than me, and always left later, and they were all depressed. And by late Friday afternoon I realised that if I stayed, I’d blink, and 20 years would have gone by, and I’d still be there …

Fitz: That sounds like the scene in Good Will Hunting when Ben Affleck says to his extremely talented best friend, Matt Damon, something like, “You have to leave here because I’ll wake up tomorrow morning and I’ll be 50, and I’ll hate you if you are still here.” Did that line resonate with you?

CP: Yeah, I remember it very clearly. And I was deeply affected by another Robin Williams movie, Dead Poets Society, the carpe diem scene – seize the day. That always resonated with me, maybe because I actually don’t process consequences, or I’m impulsive.

Fitz: So Blake’s gives you a deferment and, ladies and gentlemen, for our next stand-up comedian of the night, please give it up for … Charlie Pickering!

CP: Yup, two and a half years later, Blake’s called again, to give me an ultimatum: “You’ve had your last deferment, and if you aren’t back next week, the job’s gone forever.” I was in the back of a car with other comedians, heading to the Adelaide Festival. I was earning $150 a week, and didn’t hesitate: “Thank you, but I’m out. And it’s not you, it’s me.” It was in that moment that I just realised that, as hard as it was to be a comedian, that was where I belonged. And I knew it would force me to commit 100 per cent to it.

Fitz: It goes well. Right until you find yourself at the Edinburgh Festival of 2005, as runner-up in the Best Newcomer prize, to some loser by the name of Tim Minchin?

CP: Yes! And it’s been a wild but joyous ride ever since. Not the corner office, but the real stuff of life, the good, the bad and the horrible things that let you know you are truly alive. I was once headlining a gig at the Coventry Aquatic Centre in England, to just six people. At the break in the middle, four people left, and so there were two people left by the time I went on. And then they got up and walked out. It was a delightful old couple, and they walked up to the stage and they said to me, “We’re going home now”. I said, “Well good night, drive safely”. And it was humiliating enough. But then the man said, “Yes, we paid to see a comedian”, and they walked out! But, like, for every one of those things, there were also just magical, magical moments.

Fitz: Like finding yourself as the founding co-host of The Project in 2009, soon to be the coolest show on television! It was phenomenally successful, but suddenly, after five years and enjoying acclaim as never before, you up sticks and leave, with nothing to go to! Why?

CP: It’s complicated. I deeply loved my experience on The Project. And I loved that feeling of building the plane while you’re flying it, while literally never really having an idea of what it is. And I don’t think it’s unfair to say I’m not entirely sure The Project ever 100 per cent figured out what it is. There was always this tension between comedy and news within the show …

Fitz: Yes …?

CP: And it wanted to be funny, but it also wanted to be serious. Most of the time, in its original iteration, I think we pulled that off pretty well. And because I was able to wear both hats, I prospered. I had a skill set that really suited the show and allowed the show to not know if it was funny or serious, and I think that’s when the show was at its best. But within that, I started to develop this unavoidable feeling that over time I was becoming Ron Burgundy of Anchorman fame, the slick host, just reading the lines. And though I was very comfortable, again I felt I could blink and 10 years will go by, and I’ll still be here and that’s when I’ll be Ron Burgundy. And so I thought, “Well, I can either do that and spend the rest of my life wondering what else I could have been doing, or I can try something else.” Plus, my wife and I had a baby on the way, and with The Project I was at work from 10 in the morning and not getting home before 8.30pm five nights a week. And so there was a realisation that if I stay, I’m never going to be able to bathe the baby or put it to bed.

Fitz: Enter The Weekly on the ABC. How did that come about?

CP: Jon Casimir, the head of ABC Entertainment, who has made some of the most successful shows on TV, wanted me to make a show at the ABC, and he said, “At the ABC, you can never be too smart or too funny.” I realised what he was saying was “Aim as high as you can, and be as funny as you can, because that’s what our audience deserves.” And it was so refreshing because in various iterations of various networks I had been told the opposite thing: “Never be too smart, never be too funny”, right?

Fitz: Because you’ll leave the mob behind?

CP: Yeah, but I never agreed. I think that’s what the commercial networks sometimes believe, but I find the disrespect inherent in that to be galling, and it patronises the Australian people enormously, to think all they want is trash television.

Fitz: But the most successful show in Australia right now is Married at First Sight?

CP: That’s right. That’s absolutely true, but I don’t think that’s because people are stupid. I think it’s because they’re attracted to the sensational, and all the conflicts.

PF: So in a nutshell, what was the idea of The Weekly?

CP: [Laughing] To rip off Jon Stewart, and The Daily Show!

Fitz: And John Oliver’s This Week Tonight!

CP: And John Oliver. The format is still essentially comedic news bulletin with comedian correspondents, with an interview and other content. We didn’t invent it, but nor did John Oliver or Jon Stewart. It’s been going for decades in various iterations, and at its core it is taking the artificial authority created by the news desk and subverting it for the purpose of comedy and making points.

Fitz: And you’ve been extraordinarily successful. When I hear my wife laughing uproariously at the TV or iPad, I know she is watching either you, Stephen Colbert or John Oliver. And she is one of millions who love it.

CP: That’s very kind, but …

Fitz: But let me take you to my favourite one of your takedowns: your complete excoriation of then-senator Cory Bernardi a few years back, with his carry-on over certifying halal foods. It was a hilarious eight minutes of great TV that completely destroyed Bernardi’s argument that halal foods were a danger to shipping. I don’t know if you were responsible for ending Bernardi’s career, but – hats off – it wouldn’t have helped. But really, it was excoriation much more than it was comedic. You made brilliant points that were journalistic points, and there was nowhere to go for him.

CP: And your question?

Fitz: You have a new chair at the ABC, Kim Williams. His opening remarks are that from now on, everyone at the ABC has to be “impartial”. That was brilliant television but it wasn’t impartial. It was very partial, even partisan. It was saying that the honorable senator for South Australia was spouting complete and utter bullshit – and I’m saying it on the ABC!

CP: [Long pause] Well, yeah, it’ll be interesting if Kim Williams even watches what I do. He will probably be far too busy with the newsroom, I’d say. But I trust that he’s got reasonable judgment. But, yes, we took a position, that’s absolutely true. But the way we build things is we have evidence, and we just try to put facts in order which is the discipline of the ABC generally. And it was very funny, and an important story to do. I’ve got no fear saying that underneath all of Bernardi’s ranting was an obvious dog whistle, with xenophobia underneath it. And it has to be called out because at some point, we have to let all of that shit go if we are going to get any better in this world. If we hang on to that tired old shit, then we are not going to solve much bigger problems that we have to collectively work together to do, whether it’s housing, the environment, cost of living, or the way the algorithm of the economy in this country keeps seeing the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.

Fitz: Which brings me to my next question, given your career has taken surprising turns … let’s just say it takes another surprising turn and that – passing over the vacancy there will soon be as media minder for the New South Wales Police Commissioner – you in fact take a stint as media minder for Peter Dutton. Given your background, your understanding of politics, how would you sell him better to the Australian people, if this is what you had to do to feed your family?

CP: [Pause] Well, I am quite relieved that I don’t have to do that to feed my family purely because it’s a very hard job and I’m not sure I’m the best person for it. But I remember recent political history, which was Tony Abbott’s landslide election, and his first budget which had the main assumption that deep down Australia wanted Margaret Thatcher, right? It was based on the idea that Australia was a deeply conservative country that had finally been given the leader they were desperate to have, and that we all believed in a very harsh market capitalist view of the world. And you saw how quickly his popularity fell, and he ceased to be prime minister. Because the truth of the matter is, Australia is smack bang in the middle, politically. And so for me, if you are going to help Peter Dutton succeed, it’s less about marketing and more about the Liberal Party understanding where Australia really is. And they don’t want Margaret Thatcher.

Fitz: Go on …

An unlikely combination. Credit: Network 10/SMH

CP: I would encourage Peter Dutton not to take the ultra-conservative brand of politics to the outer suburbs. I still don’t think that’s Australia. I really don’t. John Howard never did that. John Howard was never ultra-conservative like that, and never assumed the outer suburbs were like that. He had the gift of telling them they were the heartland of Australia, and giving them heartland policies, which were not ultra-conservative.

Fitz: How would you sell Albo better?

CP: He’s already done well to present himself as the centre. But I would have him focus more on kitchen table issues that affect people. Yes, the economy is doing very well. But inflation means that not all people are doing well in this economy, and so he has to, I think, grab some big levers of economics to make things more attainable for the people who are doing it much tougher in this environment. I think what he did in changing the stage 3 tax cuts was very telling, and I do think that he has an intention to make things fairer. But I think he has to get better at selling those things that he does.

Fitz: Thank you, and we will watch your next career move with interest.

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