A comedian’s advice to their younger self: ‘Get a double bed and be more forward’

Each week, Benjamin Law asks public figures to discuss the subjects we’re told to keep private by getting them to roll a die. The numbers they land on are the topics they’re given. This week, he talks to Rhys Nicholson. The comedian and actor, 34, won the outstanding show gong at the 2022 Melbourne International Comedy Festival. Nicholson is the author of the memoir Dish and a judge on RuPaul’s Drag Race Down Under.

Rhys Nicholson: “If I could wear a bustle and be full Victorian nanny, I’d be very comfortable.”

SEX

When I say sex, what’s the first thing that comes to mind? My husband, I guess. [More convincingly] My husband!

Is that the right choice? Oh, absolutely. Honestly, as I get older, I realise I’m not as horny as I think I am …

Why? What do you think you project and what’s the reality? Well, in my act, I’m “very” dirty. But I’m not as dirty as I used to be, and I think I’m kind of a prude when it comes to actual sex. When we watched Saltburn, I was just laughing a lot because of how explicit things were.

Nervous laughter? I was just like, “Jesus Christ!” But I’m very comfortable talking about it; I find it fascinating. As queer people, it’s hard not to be morbidly curious about it because we’ve spent so much time analysing our own sexuality in order to be ourselves. And as queer people, we all have to essentially say to our parents, “I’m interested in anal.”

What was the gulf between the sex education you got and the one you should’ve had? Oh, f---ing enormous. They tell us the how, but they don’t tell us the why. I think why we have sex is far more important than how because you’re going to work it out. But it took me a long time to be comfortable with sex. For the first three months that my husband and I were seeing each other, we would have sex and I would have a shirt on the whole time – just Donald Duckin’ it. I am very uncomfortable with nudity. It’s probably the reason I wear suits all the time. If I could wear a bustle and be full Victorian nanny, I’d be very comfortable.

If you could go back in time and give a younger version of yourself a pep talk about sex, what would you say? First: get a double bed. Don’t spend the first two years living out of home in a single bed. And be a bit more forward. I was very unforward and would ignore it if people were hitting on me. I wouldn’t say disrespect yourself, but I think I was pretty hot at times in my early 20s and could’ve been getting railed.

POLITICS

If you were to run for office – the Rhys Party – what would your platforms be? I’m going to get Pepsi in the bubblers. No homework! [Laughs] But something like legalising cannabis for recreational use would bring in so much money and change the shape of the prison system in Australia. If you’re Indigenous, you’re so much more likely to be arrested for a small amount of cannabis.

How has being queer in the stand-up scene changed? Even 15 years ago – when I started – I always had to make a joke at the start of my set [about being queer]. The material I was doing was definitely for straight people – as in it was really punching down at my own community. In retrospect, it’s not how I meant it, but I was a gay slut persona of myself on stage, and made jokes at my own expense. What is really heartening – and I see it in the comedy club I co-own – is that all the new queer kids coming up are so sure of themselves. They do not make jokes [at their own expense] and they will go an audience member if they do.

DEATH

In comedy, they talk about killing and dying. Killing is when you slay the audience. Dying is when you are dead on stage. When was the last time you killed? I’m working on new material at the moment, which means that you don’t kill very often. But then, you have these little wins. Every now and then, I’ll just blurt something out that resonates. That’s kind of what comedy is, in a weird way.

What about dying? When I first started dying, it was dead silence. No one’s got an opinion about you. You’re just talking to nothing. But I’m very lucky: I’ve become more successful and me bombing now feels like what would’ve been killing 15 years ago.

As a comedian, how do you stave off career death? In comedy, it’s inevitable. The job is to be relevant. But I’m in a very nice position at the moment. The rooms are getting bigger. Inevitably, that will plateau, then they’ll get steadily smaller, and then your agent starts saying things like, “I think it’s an intimate tour this year.” That will change. It might be in 20 years, it might be in two years, it might be in a few months. It might be when people hear me talk about anal at the back of the paper.

How would you like to die? I mean, it’s the cliché, but probably heroin. I woke up the other day, in the middle of the night, in a lot of pain. I thought it was my appendix, but it turned out it was the other side. They took me to the emergency room and thought it might’ve been a kidney stone, then the pain went away the next day. We dunno what that was, but they gave me [addictive pain-relief opioid] oxycodone. I’d never had anything like it before. And I am not making light of the oxy crisis, but it was like … I get it! I was in the most pain I’ve ever been in my life … then 10 minutes later, I was fine and thinking, “Well, this is wonderful.”

So all those people caught in the opioid crisis, you’re like, “What’s happened to you is awful, but I also get it.” I totally understand. As in, I empathise. I don’t condone it. But I … endone it?

Rhys Nicholson is performing at the Sydney, Brisbane and Perth comedy festivals in April and May.

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