Netflix and BBC’s hilarious series Cunk on Earth is a great example of dry humour: a parody of history documentaries, in which the pinheaded host Philomena Cunk matter-of-factly presents an inordinate array of absurd observations. One word that comes to mind is “deadpan” – a style of comedy refined by Australia’s John Clarke and Bryan Dawe.
The beloved pair, who finessed their craft in the short-form series Clarke and Dawe, created a more elaborate half-hour comedy show called The Games, an Olympics-themed series that premiered in 1998 and ran for two seasons. The Games is framed as an ABC documentary series following bumbling bureaucrats working for the Sydney organising committee for the Olympic Games (Socog), which has been tasked with preparing the 2000 Olympics.
Full of spiralling conversations and double Dutch gasbaggery – one part Seinfeldian nothingness, two parts crap spin doctoring – the show in many ways sets the high-water mark for their careers in satire. This is particularly true of Clarke, who was the co-creator and co-writer (with Ross Stevenson) and also the star, providing the hilariously unstable centre of gravity around which the drama and comedy orbits. With the greatest respect to Dawe – reliable as always – and a very entertaining, very frustrated Gina Riley (best-known as Kim from Kath & Kim), the show, or something similar, could have been made without them. But it could never have been made without Clarke.
Part of the comedy revolves around John (each character taking the first name of the actor) being a fossil from another era and a kind of proto-David Brent: the sort of loud, narrow-minded man who ceased to be culturally relevant a long time ago. He’s the head of administration and logistics; Bryan is the accounts and finances manager; Gina is in charge of marketing. Breaking the fourth wall is veteran political journalist Barrie Cassidy, who is recruited in the first episode to provide much-needed advice to the trio about how to conduct a press conference.
An early laugh-out-loud moment occurs during this conference, when John responds to a female journalist stating that he’s been “criticised for a lack of women in your organisation”. “Hang on a minute!” cries the glass-jawed John, before delivering his version of the, erm, perfect riposte: “A lot of the blokes who work here are married and obviously their wives would have a fairly active interest.” Bryan concurs, adding: “Very active interest, in fact.”
The show hits its stride in episode four – which includes a very funny revelation (arrived at after much fuming and flimflam) that the 100-metre track is technically 94 metres long. But while the first season takes a little bit to start sizzling, the second bolts out of the gates with a hilarious and innovative opening: a voiceover declares that “tonight’s episode of the popular documentary series The Games has been held over and will be broadcast at a later date”, with the ABC instead choosing to present “a special program in the public interest”. This episode takes the form of a Four Corners-esque documentary (narrated by the late Australian journalist Liz Jackson) investigating John and Socog. Talking points include a fiasco surrounding selling tickets (“The main thing is the people who did get seats have got them,” Gina insists) and allegations that two of John’s aunties spent “$16,000 on light refreshments while attending the annual nose flute festival as guests of the Peruvian government”.
The second season was broadcast in 2000 – the same year, of course, as the Olympic Games themselves. In the years that followed, the ABC ran other political satires, including the funny and prickly Grass Roots (focused on council administration and politicking), which premiered in 2000, and The Hollowmen (about bureaucrats tasked with re-electing the prime minister), which launched in 2008. None of these satires, including The Games, are as sharp as British greats such as Yes Minister or The Thick of It, high though that bar may be. But they give them a run for their money in other areas, offering a distinctly Australian kind of dryness. And The Games has a special weapon: the inimitable John Clarke.
