Sitting in therapy, my admissions or should I say the delivery of my admissions often leave my therapist in fits of laughter, I think I just might be good at this therapy stuff. Maybe I could be a stand-up comedian, and land that Netflix special.
If you don’t laugh, you cry.
This thought has crossed my mind more than once. I have never had the guts to do it because the people involved in my comedic material, actors starring in my darkest secrets and memories – my dearest parents – would no doubt be in the audience to support me. To have them hear me air our shared familial history in its richness… I would rather melt into the floor.
Well Irish-man Tom Moran did just that, remaining undaunted in his 70 minute stand up show in the Sydney Fringe Festival; Tom Moran is a Big Fat Filthy Disgusting Liar. A therapist mother and a father who cannot say “I love you” and expresses emotions through Whatsapp emojis provide the show’s foundation for the off kilter dynamic.
Unfortunately, this tension is primed for hapless stories; an individual raised in a liminal space of emotional expression, availability and unhealthy coping mechanisms. This leads to alcoholism and its coming to the fore; performing hungover in a children’s theatre Christmas production which cannot afford the rights to Jingle Bells. Ain’t life rosy!
We have all feigned illness to get out of a day of school for whatever reason but Moran takes you one step further:accidentally faking a sore stomach leading to “appendicitis” and having an appendix removed to miss the day of school rather than come clean and disappoint his mother.
Moran weaves a tapestry of childhood stories, with direct punchlines securing laughs and at other times putting faith into the audience to make subtle connections between jokes and draw unspoken conclusions to jokes and childhood experiences.
This self-aware humour, which leaves you laughing and then feeling guilty for laughing, lays Moran bare. Under the stage lights, Moran exposed his own faults and parental trauma of youth. He takes you on an honest soliloquy exploring the turbulence of your childhood, the impacts of your 20s and finding balance and happiness all whilst trying to heal from an eating disorder, alcohol problems and childhood trauma.
For the entire run, Moran either sits on the stool or wanders and rambles across the stage, with only a stage mic to protect him against the audience. This simple staging lays bare his internal world, and the vicious thought spirals of self judgment and loathing.
Comedians are often seen as indestructible individuals, always with a quick word, or a joke to sandwich into conversation. Yet to have the skill to allow people to laugh with your trauma is a delicate line for a performer. It takes true introspection to identify the silver linings on life and find the angle which makes life and all its complexities make sense.
I left the show reflecting on things that I have not thought about in years; memories from early childhood, my eldest daughter/people-pleasing tendencies, my relationship with my brother and my parents, and how age and time heals some wounds but makes other fester.
Tom Moran is a Big Fat Filthy Disgusting Liar ran from 24–28 September at the Touring Hub as part of Sydney Fringe Festival. The production is also part of Melbourne Fringe Festival, showing at the Festival Hub at Trades Hall from 2-6 October.
