Up the wrong tree

Arj Barker’s ready to show his love for Wellington.

AMERICAN comedian Arj Barker, known best in New Zealand as dispassionate New Yorker Dave on Flight of the Conchords, has mixed feelings about his last Wellington show.
“Some shows you just stay on track and do the jokes, then there are others where you feel very comfortable so you start to make stuff up, do the more obscure stuff and more subtle humour. It was a really loose and goofy show; I was being myself and going off script a little. It was definitely one of the more fun performances,” he says.
Unfortunately, one audience member didn’t agree.
“I get this email from someone saying, “I saw your show and I could tell you were stoned - I smelt marijuana coming out of the dressing rooms”. I haven’t smoked marijuana before a show in about ten years, so I wrote back saying all I had was a glass of red wine and furthermore I heard a lot of people laughing so I feel I’m in a position to say that the show went really well, and maybe they need to start smoking pot. I never heard back again, so maybe they did,” he says.
Barker grew up in California, and now spends his time between there and Australia, where he lives in a “shack in the country side” between breaks in the touring schedule.
“This place more than any other has embraced my comedy. I have friends all over the country now,” he says.
It was in Australia that he first met Flight of the Conchords’ Bret McKenzie and Jemaine Clement, about eight years ago.
“We were sharing a venue at the Comedy Festival and I really liked their show, but more importantly I just enjoyed their company. They are great guys and, they introduced me to their friends and we started to hang out,” he says.
Barker, who still has the Conchords’ first, self-released CD, says the boys are a “phenomenon”.
“I’ve seen people spontaneously cry when they walk out of the studio, they’re like the Beatles.”
Barker’s Comedy Festival 2011 show will tackle “Eleven of the most controversial topics around, including 3D movies, death, Google maps and prawns”, and if Wellington audiences are as great as he remembers, there’s bound to be some unexpected magic too.
Arj Barker: First Laughs, NZ Comedy Festival, The Opera House, May 1. Eleven, The Opera House, May 4.