Last drinks with David Massingham

David as a monologist for Cool Story Bro

Brisbane’s sketch sweetheart David Massingham is packing up his costumes and mime-throwing them over his shoulder to move to the bitter streets of Melbourne. Before Dave leaves us for the soggy bottom of Australia, Big Forker Taylor sat down to chat about his time with Get It* Inya.

Taylor - So Dave you’ve been with Get It* Inya for almost its entirety, is that correct

David – Yes it must be almost a year and a half ago since I did my first one

Do you remember your first sketch with us?

I’m pretty sure it was A Bibliography of Silverfish - an eccentric English professor has the important task of categorising and naming the most important collective nouns for the year. It has a bunch of stupid jokes in it, like a Babushka Doll of babushka dolls and a Mummy-mummy-please-mummy-please-why-won’t-you-wake-up-of-orphans.

Dark! But you’ve taken that sketch to a couple of stand up rooms now, how’s it been received?

It’s worked surprisingly well! The great thing about it is the sketch is essentially a list of jokes that I can mix up, and when I’m feeling lazy on a stand up room night I can trot it out and write an extra six sketches on the bus. I mean jokes! Six sketches is a lot of work!

Too much work! Jumping forward to now this is your last Get It* Inya. Well, not your last last...

It’s my absolute last final full stop never coming back (Dave starts spitting on the ground). That’s not true I’m sure I’ll do more of them.

Well what are your feelings leaving the regularity of Get It* Inya?

There really isn’t anywhere else like that in Brisbane and there might not be too many in Melbourne either, so that’s a bummer. I love the fact there’s this monthly sketch comedy place where I can test something out in a ready, willing and able environment. The audience is always up for it!

A Bibliography of Silverfish - Dave's first Get It* Inya sketch!

How do you think Get It* Inya has changed you as a performer or writer?

I’ve been more willing to perform stuff that I am not 100% sure on. The first time I started performing anything with a lot of audience interaction was at Get It* Inya - this was the space I could find out if I could make it work. But if something doesn’t work it’s OK! There’s always something new around the corner so if the audience doesn’t like you they might like the next performer. Thankfully there hasn’t been too many times it didn’t wor-

Do you remember which sketch didn’t work? Sketches there can soar or explode!

Well that’s Get It* inya! There’s one sketch that I like a lot but when I did it at Get It* Inya it went for 6 minutes and the audience’s feelings were like a wave going “We like it WE LIKE IT! WE DON’T LIKE IT we don’t like it we don’t like it… we like it we like it we hate it we hate it we haaate it”. It’s called Flavour of the Month, I play a crazy old coot

Ah I remember this…

And he would tell the story of how common phrases came about by dropping another phrase and going “oh that phrase! That reminds me…”. From the audience’s perspective it was more like “How long is he going to keep doing this?” Which is kind of the point of the sketch.

But not in a good way

No! Also afterwards I realised I was basically just playing Grandpa Simpson. That’s not good. Come up with your own characters David, come on.

We’ll await the copyright infringement notice in the mail. Do you have any particularly fond memories of your time at Get It* Inya?

There are so many sketches I have loved watching. My favourite of yours is your instructions for how to fold a fitted sheet. That one really cracked me up! Tim Byrnes is always going to do something weird and fun. Cheeky Moon did a seven minute word association sketch kinda like Flavour of the Month but instead of thinking it’s too much you think “No its going through time and now it’s gone beyond too much and I’m so glad it went this long!” My favourite of my own was Cradle Me in Your Arms.

That time Dave got half of the audience on stage for the first ever Cradle Me In Your Arms sketch

One thing I’ve noticed Dave is you’ve lightened up and accepted the chaos that surrounds you each night. But you still tell everyone before the show “don’t come in my scene”!

No its scripted!

It’s still unnecessary to say before every show

I like the absurdity of it. Of course you’re not coming into my scene, why would you! There’s a friendly improv phrase everyone says before a show - they pat each other and say “I’ve got your back”. It should go without saying that people wouldn’t jump into my scripted sketch but I just like to be a bit of a dick about it!

The first time you said that to me before a show I got unreasonably annoyed.

Really! You should have lightened up!

Probably! As a parting gift, what advice would you give to someone getting into sketch comedy?

(long pensive silence) Follow your absurd idea through the sketch. Remember what you first found funny when you started to write it, and make sure it all serves that idea. Conceptual comedy, that’s what I like!

Dave, it’s been an absolute pleasure having you in the Get It* Inya family

It’s been an absolute pleasure from start to finish.

David Massingham is one part of sketch troupe The Sexy Detectives. Dave’s final performance as an official Brisbane-based sketch comedian is this Saturday 29th October at Get It Inya’s Halloween Livestream. Cheer on the old dog from the comfort of your home, bus or anything in between! Like and follow us on Facebook to receive video notifications and tune it from 7:20pm! For more details check out the event.

Parting is such sweet sorrow