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00:11 This podcast was recorded at the Richmond Library on unceded, stolen Aboriginal land, the land of the Wurunjeri Woi Wurrung people of the Kulin Nations. We pay our respects to their elders past and present.
00:22 (jaunty piano music - treble)
00:32 PENNY: Welcome to In Those Days a podcast where we talk about yesterday's news today. On this episode Christina and I are joined by broadcaster and content creator Charlie Pickering and we're talking about the Royal Derby, which is a pub in Fitzroy. Now Charlie started a comedy room at the Derby in the early 2000s with his friend and fellow comic Michael Chamberlin. And the room was called Stage Time. So at the start of the episode Christina and I had a quick chat about our experiences performing there in the very, very early days when we first started performing stand-up. And then Charlie came by to tell us about the philosophy behind the room and the how and the why. And the when and where was kind of obvious but anyway. And then I had brought some, as per usesh, done some research, got some newspaper articles from Trove about the Royal Derby. And these articles mainly focus on the tenure of the licensee Joe Cody in the 1880s. So I really enjoy reminicing with Charlie and Christina about the olden days at the Royal Derby. And we got into a lot of different things. We talked about art and ambition, we talked about friendship and rats. But ultimately no person and no pub is ever just one thing. I hope you enjoy a very small slice of the multitudes that the Royal Derby contains.
02:02 (jaunty piano music, treble)

02:13 Stage Time, Comedy at the Derby. You performed there, didn't you Christina?
CHRISTINA: Sure did Penny.
PENNY: Tell me about that.
CHRISTINA: That was the site of my first every stand-up comedy gig.
PENNY: What a night. How were you convinced to do that?
CHRISTINA: The group that I performed with, the Improbables, they signed me up to perform and then told me that I was going to perform.
PENNY: I did not know that.
CHRISTINA: Yes, and it was all so that Adam McKenzie could film me and that was part of his documentary and Andrew McClelland had his first stand-up comedy gig that night as well.
PENNY: I think I was there that night.
CHRISTINA: So the whole thing was recorded plus the lead-up in the couple of weeks beforehand was filmed as well.
PENNY: It went really well, didn't it?
CHRISTINA: It did go well, yeah. I think so. When I have watched that tape back and listened to some of the sound-grabs I'm quite alarmed that that was what I came up with.
PENNY: Do you remember what you talked about?
CHRISTINA: I do. I remember there was something about being on work experience with a vet and dissecting a dog's leg, it was all quite weird. Not something I would do.
PENNY: You started out as an impro troupe and then you all became stand-ups eventually.
CHRISTINA: Yes, exactly. We all had to do what everyone else was doing, there was no option. I mean, I guess in some ways it was good in that I was forced to do it. Because I possibly wouldn't have otherwise.
PENNY: I did not know about that. Because you then went on to do a lot of stand-up.
CHRISTINA: I did. So it was good to be pushed over the edge.
PENNY: Do you want me to tell you about how I, my first time at Stage Time?
CHRISTINA: Yeah.
PENNY: I did Raw Comedy and I had absolutely no idea about comedy and then afterwards I won the heat, just quietly. It went much better than I expected and then afterwards Charlie came up to me and said, "That was good, do you want to come and do a spot in my room?"
CHRISTINA: Nice.
PENNY: And I had no idea what most of that sentence meant. I was literally looking around going, "What room? What are you talking about?" I didn't know what a spot was. I had no idea and then I think he must have explained it a bit more. Then I remember the first time I went to Stage Time, the night before, I did, do you remember Champagne Comedy at the Armidale?
CHRISTINA: I do. I do remember.
PENNY: Did you do Champagne Comedy at the Armidale?
CHRISTINA: I feel I might have. Did you?
PENNY: Yeah. And it was one of those ones. I was on very late at night. And it was my second ever gig. Maybe one person laughed, just at the very end. Otherwise it was dead silence and I got off stage and I was like so, like it was the worst nightmare coming true.
CHRISTINA: It can be mortifying. Yes.
PENNY: It's like what you imagine. It's the fear that people have when they think about doing stand-up. It happened to me in real life. Then these three other comics came up to me and like surrounded me and said, ‘Don't worry about it. Everyone dies here. It doesn't matter. Don't be scared.’
CHRISTINA: I think I did die there.
PENNY: And then they said, ‘Tomorrow's Stage Time, come to Stage Time at the Derby.’
CHRISTINA: All will be forgiven.
PENNY: ‘We'll all be there and it'll be fun.’ And so the next night I went. I wasn't performing, but it was just really, really nice. And everyone was so friendly. And so I went from having the nightmare to ‘oh no, it's fine. Everyone dies at the Armidale. It's fine.’
CHRISTINA: Exactly. Don't go back there. That's the lesson learnt.
PENNY: Exactly. Unfortunately, I did not take that lesson.
CHRISTINA: I think we all returned there multiple times.
PENNY: Yeah, so, I had, it was a very nice place for me to go.
CHRISTINA: Yeah, it was very nice. It was very welcoming.
PENNY: And I, you might know, I say this all the time Christina, but I am from the country.
CHRISTINA: I did know that about you, Penny. Because one of the first times I met you your dad tried to give me eggs.
PENNY: He does do that. Most times.
CHRISTINA: It's good to share.
PENNY: When he sees people. Actually, I remember him doing that at other comedy venues.
CHRISTINA: Yes, I remember him bringing them and just handing them out to random people.
PENNY: So I'm from the country so my first year at uni, I didn't really make that many friends.
CHRISTINA: Oh, neither did I.
PENNY: I was very lonely.
CHRISTINA: I had a very sad first year of uni.
PENNY: Yeah, and all my other friends from the country were starting to make friends in Melbourne.
CHRISTINA: You didn't amalgamate.
PENNY: I didn't. I did not assimilate very well. So actually, it was when I started doing standup and going places like the Royal Derby, that was like the first place where I went in Melbourne where I felt like people, it was okay.
CHRISTINA: I think, yeah, first year uni was really daunting for me as well. I didn't enjoy myself.
PENNY: I thought it was just kids from the country!?
CHRISTINA: No, because I wanted to get into Vet Science so I felt like my first year of uni was what Year 12 was for most people. I hadn't gone hell for leather in Year 12. I'd kind of cruised along and then first year was my horror show.
PENNY: But then you got the marks, but then you didn't do it?
CHRISTINA: No, I didn't get the marks. I got the marks to do a full-fee paying place and I couldn't take that. That's okay, I've reconciled that in my head now.
PENNY: So when did you start doing Improbables? Were they your?
CHRISTINA: In second year.
PENNY: Ah, same thing.
CHRISTINA: I think there was a lot of reflection and ‘You can't have another year like that last year, or else it's not going to work.’ Cos I started to go, ‘Should I take a year off and be a Jillaroo?’ Like I started to have massive crisis.
PENNY: I still think maybe you should take a year off to be a Jillaroo.
CHRISTINA: Maybe it is required. I don't know. It could be beneficial.
PENNY: At any point, you could do that.
CHRISTINA: It's there as the backup plan. Because I actually did have the form and everything I was quite serious.
PENNY: The Jillaroo form. Name: Jill.
CHRISTINA: Surname: Aroo.
PENNY: Great. So how did you actually meet the Improbables? Such as they were. Before they were, when they were probable.
CHRISTINA: At the time there was a real clique in the Melbourne Uni theatre scene. A lot of people who were in the original Improbables had tried to get into various things and had been quite unsuccessful and I think we were all basically little theatre nerds from high school. Lawrence and Andrew advertised that they were.
PENNY: Did you respond to an ad?
CHRISTINA: I did, which was very bold of me but it also a girl I had gone to school with also came along to that as well.
PENNY: Did she get in?
CHRISTINA: No.
PENNY: And then everything changed.
CHRISTINA: Then everything changed.
PENNY: Vistas opened up, matching t-shirts were printed.
CHRISTINA: The black-framed glasses that were non-prescription with a pink lens that I wore constantly.
PENNY: And the thing is, I was at Melbourne Uni at the same, roughly the same time. But I never saw the Improbables perform as a group, but I saw you, I knew you all separately when you were doing stand-up and then last year in 2023 the Improbables reunited.
CHRISTINA: We did.
PENNY: For one night only.
CHRISTINA: Blink and you'll miss it. A lot of people did miss it.
PENNY: Well, the room was packed. It was sold out. They simply could not get in had they wanted to. But I bought my ticket very early and
CHRISTINA: You were keen.
PENNY: And I was there. And I was just absolutely, no one was more excited than me. And I was doing sort of expectation management on myself in the lead-up. I was saying, ‘Penny it might not, come on.’
CHRISTINA: It might be uncomfortably bad.
PENNY: ‘They haven't performed together for awhile.’ And then I got there and it was as good as I'd hoped.
CHRISTINA: Just seamless.
PENNY: It was beautiful and I just smiled, I was grinning and laughing the whole way through.
CHRISTINA: It was a fun time.
PENNY: I mean, I think I was wearing a facemask, but otherwise, I looked deranged.
CHRISTINA: Underneath it was happiness.
08:40 (Jaunty piano music, soprano section).
PENNY: We're very lucky to have Charlie Pickering here and he is, I'm gonna list some things and let me know if I've left off anything?
CHARLIE: That would be the most arrogant thing to do.
PENNY: You reckon?
CHRISTINA: I think you'll find some of my other achievements include
CHARLIE: I think you'll find three-time winner of the Brighton Grammar Public Speaking competition was not on that list.
PENNY: I think you're a comedian, you're a TV host, you're an author, producer. Anything else?
CHARLIE: That's fine.
PENNY: That's good?
CHARLIE: I say things like broadcaster.
PENNY: Broadcaster.
CHARLIE: Just to encapsulate everything. But that makes me, it shows that I believe in heritage media more than these kids today.
PENNY: Ah, right.
CHARLIE: If you know what I mean. They're content creators, I'm a broadcaster.
PENNY: I think you are though.
CHARLIE: A content creator?
PENNY: A broadcaster.
CHARLIE: Oh yeah.
CHRISTINA: Both, both. That got awkward.
PENNY: I met you I think about 25-ish years ago.
CHARLIE: It's close to, yeah.
PENNY: And I was telling Christina it was after my first every gig and you came up and you asked me if I wanted to come and perform at the Royal Derby at your show Stage Time. And so that's what we're gonna talk about today. We're talking about two sets of olden days
CHARLIE: Sorry, are we talking your first gig, or that conversation?
PENNY: No, we are talking about the Royal Derby
CHRISTINA: We're gonna analyse that conversation for an hour.
PENNY: No, the Royal Derby. So we're talking about the olden days in the Royal Derby both when you ran a comedy room there and then even more olden days than that, going back to when it first was a pub.
CHARLIE: I think anything called the Royal Derby, it has to be old.
CHRISTINA: There's gotta be stuff going on. Maybe there were murders there. We don't know.
PENNY: Well, I looked but I couldn't. I mean, there are a few dead children, but
CHARLIE: We ran a comedy night, there were lots of deaths. Definitely.
CHRISTINA: A lot of people died up there. But in the supportive way.
CHARLIE: Absolutely, welcoming environment.
PENNY: So we use Trove a lot for this pocast. Digitised newspapers particularly in Trove. Do you use Trove? For work or fun?
CHARLIE: Do you know, it's come up a couple of times researching for the Weekly. Like, I remember we did a deep dive piece about Western Australian secession. About the long-standing movement for Western Australian independence to be their own country and to find stuff on that Trove was really good. I'm just trying to think, it comes up occasionally. I'm very familiar with it because my wife is also a writer and she's much better at research than I am. And so she will find things on Trove that I never knew existed. So yeah, I'm familiar with Trove and what it does. And it is one of those things that we are so privileged having the internet because we grew up without it and we know what life was like before the internet and now we go like 'I want this thing to exist' and you just search it and just expect it to be there. It's like whatever you imagine is going to appear on the internet. And Trove, for me, is one of those places where that can happen.
PENNY: You can find out things that would have been very difficult to discover and would have taken a lot of time. It's really kind of
CHARLIE: On leg-work. You'd have to actually go to physical archives and find things. I remember when I was at university things weren't really digitised at all.
CHRISTINA: No. It was hard, it was hard work.
CHARLIE: You had to go to libraries. And books.
PENNY: Lot of photocopying.
CHRISTINA: Lug books around.
CHARLIE: Urgh, nightmare.
CHRISTINA: And if someone had got there first, the book that you needed
PENNY: So I have found some articles on the Royal Derby in Trove. There were actually quite a few. Your background with the Royal Derby is that you started Stage Time there. What year did you start it?
CHARLIE: The first ever Stage Time show we did, if I'm correct, it was either '99 or 2000. We did a 3-week run, and by that, it was 3 Tuesday nights in the Fringe Festival. So it was around October and I think it was either '99 or 2000. I think it might have even been '99 was the first time that we did.
PENNY: So I was in Year 12 that year, didn't go to that one.
CHARLIE: Rub it in. That's fine.
PENNY: Yeah, cos I'm so young. So young and fresh. But it wasn't just you. You started it with Michael Chamberlin, didn't you?
CHARLIE: Yes, and we were sort of creative partners like we were in a comedy duo. Or really, the comedy duo kind out of that. It was a bit chicken and egg. But we also, we were running a little, we were trying to run a production company and make sketch-comedy pilots and try and get jobs in TV.
PENNY: You were so organised.
CHARLIE: It's funny, everyone said that at the time. I mean Michael will tell you that I'm not organised in any way whatsoever. But see, it's interesting, he's more organised than I am, and I'm more driven. Like I was. So It think that was always a good mix. He was always uncomfortable. He was always uncomfortable talking up what we were doing. And that was the thing, I was happy to talk to anyone and say,
CHRISTINA: But you do all the background stuff.
CHARLIE: And so, it was just a good combination but the core principle behind it was we had both done a bunch of sketch comedy before through university reviews and stuff like that. And we wanted to get into stand-up cos we realised if you weren't part of that world you were actually disconnected to what comedy was in Australia and if your career was gonna progress you had to be a part of that.
PENNY: This is very strategic thinking.
CHARLIE: I'm someone who walked away from a job in a massive law firm so I had to. So to make my parents not completely disown me I had to make a career of it.
CHRISTINA: There had to be a plan. You need an action plan.
CHARLIE: The simplest thing of it was though, we had both started doing stand-up. At that time in Melbourne, it's probably not that much different now, there weren't many small rooms. You'd get a gig, you'd get an open mic spot to do five minutes. And then you might get another one 2 months later, 3 months later. And we just figured out that you can't learn and improve if you've got one gig every 2 months. So we were like, let's run our own gig that way we'll have a gig every week and we'll do it faster. Like, we'll just learn, we'll make all these mistakes and the whole point, we called it Stage Time because it was literally about us getting stage time. And then it evolved from there that we developed this lovely little scene like this little eco-system of young comics who liked hanging out with other young people from comedy. We made friends with everyone. That was our social group. If we got other gigs, we'd all go and watch each other's gigs as well. And it grew out of that. If anything that was the real beauty of it was it became a bit of a meeting point and a central place for people starting out.
PENNY: I think that's right, and I think that's why people still remember it now.
CHARLIE: Well that's funny, you say people remember it now. I think of you doing a gig there. We also did a Raw Comedy heat, I think we were in a Raw Comedy heat together at one point.
PENNY: Yeah.
CHARLIE: I remember you came and gigged there. And I remember one of Geraldine Hickey's first gigs was.
PENNY: That would be right, it would be because she was in Raw Comedy that year as well. Yeah.
CHARLIE: We just thought she was super funny and wanted her to come along. It was interesting there were some really funny people who couldn't get a gig at other places for whatever reasons. Most of the time because they didn't know the right bloke.
CHRISTINA: But I think there was a lot of, around that time there were a lot of blokey, as you've identified rooms, where, unless you were prepared to put in the schmooze time and hang out there and be there week in week out, you kind of didn't earn the right to get a gig or something. It was a little bit strange.
CHARLIE: That's really true.
PENNY: And also, some of those places that would have been alright maybe if you'd felt comfortable there.
CHRISTINA: If you'd felt comfortable hanging out there.
CHARLIE: The weird thing is I'm an incredibly privileged, middle-class, white male.
PENNY: Nooooo.
CHARLIE: But I've somehow made it. But it's funny, I understand all of that so much better now. At the time I had no awareness of any of that because, like I just had that blinkered view that everyone just goes and asks for a gig, and you get a gig or you don't get, all of that. I had no concept of the additional challenges you faced if you weren't a bloke starting out in comedy. And it's funny, I think by accident, and I think it's just because Michael and I were fairly polite, well-raised guys. That we weren't mean,
CHRISTINA: No.
CHARLIE: We weren't predators.
PENNY: No, you weren't.
CHARLIE: We never. Funny's funny and it might be generational. We just never came through with that perception that there was any difference, or that there should be any difference. So maybe we were something of a safer space. We might not have been entirely safe, but a safer space for all people.
CHRISTINA: Absolutely.
PENNY: I would absolutely agree with that.
CHARLIE: Just because Michael are safe beta-males.
PENNY: There are some aspects of this that I will not go into.
CHARLIE: Nothing's off the table, don't worry. I'll talk about anything.
PENNY: Before it was the Royal Derby, it wasn't the first pub on the site. So it's on the corner of Alexandra Parade and Brunswick Street. Before it was the Royal Derby it was the William Tell. And then it was the Globe Hotel, the Woods Hotel, the Derby and then it became the Royal Derby.
CHARLIE: It should go back to being the William Tell. That's a great name.
PENNY: Yeah, it was.
CHARLIE: That's such a great English style pub name. Oh, you'd go down to the William Tell, wouldn't you? Love it. William Tell, my understanding, you have the Willilam Tell Overture, everyone knows it. But William Tell shot an apple off his son's head with a bow and arrow. Is that right?
CHRISTINA: Yeah absolutely.
PENNY: Is that true? I don't know.
CHARLIE: See, you've got your logo ready to go. Brilliant.
PENNY: I mean, I think there are other William Tell, I think there was another William Tell pub in the city.
CHARLIE: And you could really have a great drinks promo that you come down. If you can shoot an apple of someone's head you get a free
CHRISTINA: Appletini or something.
CHARLIE: An appletini. I was just gonna go a jug.
CHRISTINA: Yeah, appletini. Don't think I've ever had one but I'm sure it's a thing.
19:47 PENNY: It was the Royal Derby and I've got an article here about when it changed licensees, which it did frequently. So this one is from 1888 and it's from the 25th of October and it was in the Mercury and Weekly Courier.
"ROYAL DERBY HOTEL. AT the invitation of Mr. Cody, we paid a visit to his establishment, the Royal Derby Hotel, at the corner of Brunswick-street and Alexandra-parade."
Now when it says "at the invitation of" I am suspecting that this article is something of an advertorial.
CHARLIE: Yeah, it feels like it. Is this just an announcement of a change of licence?
CHRISTINA: Or is it a press release?
PENNY: It's very positive. It's a very positive article. I think they invited the journalist along, they probably gave them some drinks, maybe they were friends.
CHARLIE: Let'm know how we're going to be doing it. "Hey, we've roasted a pheasant. Grab a drumstick".
PENNY: Exactly. How did you advertise, the Der- Stage Time rather?
CHARLIE: We almost didn't. Like it was word of mouth and we tried to build an email list. But one
PENNY: Ever invite any journalists down there and just give’m drinks?
CHRISTINA: Ply them.
CHARLIE: For Fringe Festival and stuff we did.
PENNY: Yeah, it's part of it.
CHARLIE: Yeah we probably tried to ply journalists with drinks, that's really true. The only time we only really did advertising, you would be familiar possibly with Kevin Whyte who runs Token?
PENNY: Yeah.
CHARLIE: Who's probably the most powerful person in comedy in Australia. I think that's almost 100% safe to say.
CHRISTINA: Yep, that's a given.
CHARLIE: There's a lot of reputation that comes with that. But as a young comedian starting out, he couldn't have been more supportive. And there was a point where like he came down to Stage Time and saw what we were doing and afterwards said, ‘Just come in for a meeting this week.’ And we went in, and he was smoking in his office. Back in the days, it was great. And I was a heavy smoker, and I was, ‘This is heaven, welcome to show biz.’ But he said, ‘There's no point me managing you guys and taking your money now cos you're not making enough money to justify that. It just means you won't have petrol.’ But he said, ‘It's important that rooms like yours keep going.’ And he wrote a cheque so we could buy ads on PBS and Triple R and we recorded a bunch of, in hindsight, probably unlistenable ads. We recorded a bunch of ads that ran for about 3 months. And it was something that we absolutely could never have afforded. And never expected anything in return. I think I've paid it off now. But that was probably the only way we advertised back in the day. And it was funny, what he believed was right, you need to have rooms like that. Getting back to what we were saying before about the impenetrable blokey rooms that if you weren't called Dave it was hard to get a gig.
CHRISTINA: Absolutely.
CHARLIE: I think Kev understood that to have a proper comedy scene you needed places like that and the Prince Pat going because it's where comedy is actually invented it's not just sold. And they're different things.
PENNY: He's your manager now, isn't he?
CHRISTINA: He is my manager now, yeah. But he sort of held me off for a long time. And he did that out of. Like, he helped with some contracts and things but didn't manage me and was just very helpful. I also book people through Token to go on my TV show and I know that the experience of going through management as opposed to having management working with you is different. But my experience is Kev's just lovely. Although I say that, he's also given it to me straight when I've needed it along the way. Yeah, no-one is ever one thing. How 'bout that?
PENNY: That's very true. I'll keep reading this article slash ad:
"The house has undergone a complete transformation, the old picket fence, that was on the Brunswick street front has been cleared away, and a very handsome balcony erected round both frontages, which will prove useful as well as ornamental,"
CHRISTINA: Good to point out.
PENNY: "after the heat of the day this will be a lofty and pleasant promenade,"
CHARLIE: Get a nice cool breeze coming off Alexandra Parade.
CHRISTINA: No umbrellas at this stage.
PENNY: "and to those enjoying it a beautiful panorama of the surrounding country presents itself."
CHARLIE: I wonder what the surrounding country looked like?
PENNY: Well I can tell you. It was not called Alexandra Parade then, it was Reilly Street. It was basically sometimes just like an open sewer so they built an open drain.
CHRISTINA: It was good that they had a balcony so they could really get that experience
PENNY: Exactly. So they built a
CHARLIE: The summer waft.
PENNY: They built an open drain along there. So at this point there would have been the open drain. But it wasn't, it was meant to drain into the Merri Creek. It wasn't that successful and it often was flooding. People used to drown in it.
CHARLIE: Coming home from the pub.
CHRISTINA: Drowned in shit.
CHARLIE: Horrible way to go.
PENNY: That's another reason why I think this article may have been not entirely
CHRISTINA: Through rose-coloured glasses.
CHARLIE: You're suggesting that they're gilding the lily just a little here.
PENNY: Look, I'm not saying the balcony wasn't lovely on the Brunswick Street side, I just think maybe round the Reilly Street side it was a bit.
CHARLIE: What newspaper was this again? Was this the Argus?
PENNY: No it was the Mercury and Weekly Courier.
CHARLIE: Yeah right. That rag.
CHRISTINA: The Daily Mail of the time.
CHARLIE: They did a great line in under-boob. Though back then it was under ankle. Oh, side-ankle wardrobe malfunction.
CHRISTINA: Sighting of calf.
PENNY: That's the Derby. So it looks completely different with the balconies, which they obviously took down at some point cos now it doesn't look like that.
CHARLIE: More's the pity I'd say. Although just judging by that, where they've got the footpath, I feel like that's been reclaimed in some way. Like, it feels like there's not that much room.
PENNY: No. Yeah I think it's the roads and everything are different now, so.
CHARLIE: But that's beautiful.
PENNY: It's lovely.
CHARLIE: I'd love to paint that white though. I think it'd look terrific. It'd really pop.
CHRISTINA: A bit of a Hamptons vibe.
CHARLIE: But some Adirondacks up on the balcony. Hello.
CHRISTINA: Yes, I'd get some hanging baskets out there.
PENNY: What was the building like? Did you just stay in the pub area or did you ever wander upstairs?
CHARLIE: We used a kitchen as a changeroom at one point when we were doing some costume work.
CHRISTINA: When things got serious.
CHARLIE: Yeah. I'm just trying to think. We went upstairs at one point, just to look around. But we were, it's funny, our relationship with the Royal Derby, what I loved in your description saying the hotel changed licensees a number of times it changed licensees a number of times while we were there. It's like we constantly had to convince new management that they should keep us. And it's like it's a Tuesday night
CHRISTINA: Yeah what else is going on?
CHARLIE: And we're bringing in a hundred people. And they're like, ‘Yeah but people watching comedy don't drink as quickly as if they're watching footy or just hanging out.’ And I go, ‘Yeah, but no-one would be here.’ So we just had a string of managers that we were constantly convincing that we should stay there but we never really explored that much. I think there were some bedrooms where backpackers would stay upstairs when we were there.
PENNY: Yeah, maybe.
CHARLIE: There were some probably unlicenced backpacker scenarios going on.
CHRISTINA: Yeah, they were washing the dishes.
PENNY: Because it wasn't really a pub, I never went there except on Tuesdays for Stage Time. Did you?
CHARLIE: I had been there when I was a uni student, I was, this will surprise you, I was heavily involved in the Law Students Society and was first year coordinator and I organised the O-week pub crawl in Fitzroy, which was quite a migration from Monash to get to Fitzroy. And we started at the Builder's Arms and worked our way through I think it was 12 pubs.
CHRISTINA: Wow.
CHARLIE: And ended at the Royal Derby, cos that was at the opposite end of Brunswick.
PENNY: Oh yeah, it is, yep.
CHARLIE: So it was geographically. And what was amazing was that the band Grand WaZoo were playing a gig there when we got there. So there was a band stage. The room had a completely different orientation. It was the first place that I ever crowd surfed. Grand WaZoo who I loved, they were like a funk band, big around Carlton. And I ended up booking them playing our balls at uni and stuff like that. So I had been there and had a great night but that said it was stop number 12 on a 12-pub pub crawl.
CHRISTINA: So it was gonna be great no matter
CHARLIE: I was rolling by then.
PENNY: I'll keep reading this:
"Its close proximity to the Fitzroy railway station, the football and cricket grounds, and being in the centre of the Nicholson, Brunswick and Smith streets tram system, necessitated Mr. Cody putting his house in order to meet the numerous calls that are made upon him by country people visiting the metropolis, while the great show is on."
So it was a country pub.
CHARLIE: Now were you? Were you country folks?
CHRISTINA: Penny.
CHARLIE: Penny I recall you were regional.
CHRISTINA: I was metropolitan. Yeah but
CHARLIE: Cosmopolitan, some would say.
CHRISTINA: So cosmopolitan.
PENNY: Yeah, Balwyn.
CHRISTINA: I went a little bit off the radar.
PENNY: Oh she's now very rural.
CHRISTINA: Not really.
PENNY: Feels rural when you get to your house with all the animals. Yeah no, I was a country person. I was saying to Christina before that, you know, it's not always easy to make friends when you first move to Melbourne and probably when I started doing stand-up and when I started coming to the Derby was the first time, the first place
CHRISTINA: The first time you made a friend
PENNY: It wasn't the first friend but it was
CHARLIE: It's where you learned how to make a friend
CHRISTINA: It was that social skills course that ran just before
CHARLIE: Before then it was parallel play up until university.
PENNY: Imagine if that was your way, like just comedians were your first friends. God. No. But it was the first place that was like, outside of the friends I had who moved to the country at the same, moved to the city at the same time.
CHRISTINA: You're doing a lot of scrambling.
CHARLIE: But what's interesting about that to me is, this is definitely paid advertorial, this is unbelievable this article that we're reading. Like, it's obvious grift but I remember as a kid my grandmother taught me that the Vic Hotel in the city.
PENNY: Yes that was.
CHARLIE: Was where if people came in from the country that's where they stayed. They knew that's where they stayed.
PENNY: Yeah, somewhere they could feel comfortable.
CHARLIE: That's so funny to me. Feel comfortable away from these shysters in the city. These fast talking, confidence tricksters.
PENNY: When you don't come from the city you feel very frightened of escalators. You feel. You think everybody knows more than you. Everyone knows where everything is and you don't know and they're gonna think you're stupid and they're gonna laugh at you.
CHARLIE: That's funny. But as you know. We're scared of livestock. And don't know
PENNY: So am I
CHARLIE: And don't know which end of a cow to milk
PENNY: So am I.
CHRISTINA: It's confusing times.
CHARLIE: But so that's interesting that that's still an angle for this if you were coming in from the city that that was right. Interesting though, Fitzroy Train Station. So now I'm curious to know where this Fitzroy station was and
CHRISTINA: And what happened.
CHARLIE: Maybe trams sorted that out.
PENNY: We'll dig it up. After this we'll go we'll find it. We'll find the bloody foundations or something. Okay.
"Consequently he has about thirteen rooms exclusive of those used by his family; and in this department the bath has not been overlooked."
CHRISTINA: Good.
CHARLIE: Good.
PENNY: Which actually at the time it was often overlooked.
CHRISTINA: Imagine if it had been.
P A lot of places didn't have baths, didn't have toilets, that sort of thing. So, there were toilets when we were there.
CHARLIE: Feels like a bath was an opt in for most people visiting as well.
PENNY: It absolutely was.
CHARLIE: Country folk just going, ‘ooh, a bath.’
CHRISTINA: ‘Haven't had one of those for a few years.’
PENNY: "Mr.. Cody is busy making provision for the accommodation of a number of his country patrons who have to travel by road, in the shape of stabling and yard room. This feature we know from experience will be appreciated."
CHARLIE: People came clip-clopping into town.
PENNY: They did. And I also read in a separate article it said that sometimes they did not like to clip-clop in the city though. They wanted to park the horse at the hotel.
CHARLIE: And just go for a mosey.
PENNY: Go on the tram, little bit scared of the city traffic, which totally
CHARLIE: Totally get it.
PENNY: Makes sense.
CHARLIE: And now that I think of it, I feel like the outdoor area there may have had what were the remnants of stables that were repurposed into to sheds or anything.
CHRISTINA: I don't think I ever saw the outdoor area there.
CHARLIE: There was a bit of a courtyard outside.
PENNY: It's all adding up.
CHARLIE: The one reason to come to the Derby.
CHRISTINA: 100%
PENNY: It craps on a bit more about how you can leave your parcels there and someone else can pick them up. And there's gonna.
CHARLIE: Can't do that post September 11
PENNY: No, we'll get to that. And then, just at the end of the article and I don't know this is completely irrelevant but I'm just gonna read it anyway:
"One of the saddest and most touching sights in life is that of a young man who has spent six months in coaxing and waxing a moustache into a respect able size and shape, and then, in the act of lighting a cigar with- a slip of paper burns and scorches the whole institution into an unrecognisable mass of singed ness."
CHARLIE: That is an unnecessary detail. Shaming that poor guy. It's funny.
PENNY: It was obviously relatively common though, you can imagine they didn't have.
CHARLIE: People needed to use a fire-retardant wax. What are they doing? What paraffin or something? Idiots.
CHRISTINA: Kerosine.
PENNY: That never happened to you?
CHARLIE: No. I was a smoker.
PENNY: But you never set your beard on fire?
CHARLIE: No, I think I accidentally burned my beard. I had a terrible goatee, which some may recall. I'm trying to think if I had that when I started. Maybe I'd gotten rid of that by the time I started comedy. But back at uni I had one and I definitely burned it smoking. More than once.
PENNY: So it is very common and we shouldn't laugh.
CHARLIE: It's not very common. Two incidents that we know of.
PENNY: Well, it'd be a bit of a coincidence this one happened and I ask you.
CHARLIE: It's a lovely, okay.
PENNY: It's in the paper. It was very common then.
CHARLIE: Those associated with the Royal Derby Hotel, it's quite common.
PENNY: But the Royal Derby was not just a pub for drinking. It did have entertainments, it had tournaments, it had community group meetings
CHARLIE: Tournaments?
PENNY: Draughts. Tournaments.
CHARLIE: As in the board game?
PENNY: The board game, yeah. They had an extremely exciting game of draughts that had a long write-up in the paper. I nearly read it, but we don't have time.
CHARLIE: Chess for the every-man.
PENNY: It is. Do you like draughts?
CHARLIE: I don't mind draughts. Draughts can be fun. It's good fun.
CHRISTINA: It's more fun than chess.
PENNY: Do you not like chess?
CHRISTINA: Nah.
CHARLIE: Too much thinkin'.
PENNY: It's a lot of thinking.
CHARLIE: Too much bloody thinkin'. Give me draughts. Hungry, hungry hippos any day. That's the sport of kings.
CHRISTINA: Guess Who
PENNY: Draughts you can be very reactive. I feel with chess you really do need to think ahead. But anyway
CHARLIE: That's where I've been going wrong. I've completely misunderstood the game chess.
PENNY: This is an article about the Fitzroy Brass Band who used to perform there. So this is,
CHARLIE: Who hopefully became Grand WaZoo at same point. Because they had a big horn section.
PENNY: I wonder if Grand WaZoo knew that. Knew the traditions that they were stepping into.
CHRISTINA: I think they might have. They probably really thought about it.
34:26 PENNY: This is also from the Mercury and Weekly Courier, 13th of June 1889.
"The Fitzroy city brass band still continues its weekly recitals on the balcony of the Royal Derby Hotel, Brunswick-street,"
See this is the great thing.
CHARLIE: (trumpet sounds) It's like New Orleans. Come on!
CHRISTINA: Yeah, literally. Get out there.
PENNY: "Judging from the numbers that assemble in the open surrounding the house, the efforts are largely appreciated."
CHARLIE: Largely appreciated.
CHRISTINA: There's a small number who do not appreciate.
CHARLIE: Oh what I wouldn't give for a review at a Melbourne Comedy Festival, ‘Largely appreciated. 3 stars’.
PENNY: Are you doing a show this year?
CHARLIE: I'm not doing a show this year.
PENNY: Yeah, no, it's too much work.
CHARLIE: It's too much work when I'm doing the Weekly at the same time. That's just the truth. I tried a couple of times and once failed to muster a show and another time mustered a terrible show.
PENNY: Okay, so did people turn up the time you didn't muster a show?
CHARLIE: No I managed to, someone else needed to move into a bigger venue and I managed to just
CHRISTINA: Slide them in.
PENNY: There's nothing like a welcome cancellation, is there? When you were worried about doing something and then you decide not to do it. It's a great feeling.
CHARLIE: Cos the terror you have cancelling is what other people will think and when they're cool with it. And you just go, "Ah, that's fine". But I've learnt that lesson too many times and I just cancel everything now. Turns out I've got ADHD.
PENNY: Do you?
CHARLIE: Yeah. I got diagnosed last year.
PENNY: How exciting.
CHARLIE: Yeah, it's so exciting, isn't it? All of a sudden you look back on your life and go, "Oh, that's why."
CHRISTINA: "A lot of that makes sense now."
PENNY: Brass bands were very big at this time. There were brass bands, every suburb had it's own brass band. They would have brass band competitions. We're talking to
CHRISTINA: Lots of police bands, the police had lots of brass bands.
PENNY: So the article continues:
"Victoria is rapidly coming to the front as a music-loving community, and it is not too much to say that Fitzroy has a right to feel proud at possessing such an eminently qualified band of musicians in its midst."
CHARLIE: That's a glowing review. That's beyond "largely appreciated".
PENNY: And these brass bands really represented the communities that they were from.
CHARLIE: It's music of the streets.
PENNY: Yes.
CHRISTINA: Taking it to the people.
PENNY: And you didn't have to pay for a ticket, you just go outside, there they are.
CHARLIE: Stand under the balcony.
PENNY: Whether you like it or not.
CHRISTINA: Just inhale the noise.
PENNY: "In consequence of the excellent provision which Mr. Cody, licensee of the hotel, has made for this band it has enabled it to give oral demonstration of its efficiency."
CHARLIE: I think that's how they got the article written.
PENNY: Yeah.
CHARLIE: Mr Cody here is, he is a something of a patron. He's a Medici type figure of Fitzroy.
PENNY: Exactly, balconies, brass bands, draughts.
CHARLIE: Draughts competitions. Country folk can come and stay and feel comfortable. And their horse will get a nice pile of hay.
CHRISTINA: Endota for the pony.
PENNY: Endota for the pony!
CHRISTINA: Bit of a scrub.
CHARLIE: In-house farrier.
PENNY: Lovely.
CHRISTINA: Pick a colour.
PENNY: But Stage Time though. Yeah, you'd have your musical comedians coming on.
CHRISTINA: No, we would have musical comedians. Later on when we were not at the Derby, we were down the road a bit at Bar Open we came back when we were a little bit older. It was a Sunday afternoon gig and we'd put musical acts on in the intervals. We'd do 3 sets, which was an agreement with the pub that we had to have two breaks for people to buy booze. It's pretty basic show business. And so we would have acts. Jordy Lane would play quite a bit, just McAvoy. And we had a few others, but some really good artists, like we would have music. But in our day it was musical comedians. We managed to secure Tripod once, early days.
PENNY: That's exciting. You would have been so excited.
CHARLIE: We were. I remember probably the first big act, maybe the first big. Like we got Wil Anderson, during a comedy festival. And we offered him an insulting low amount of money and he wouldn't even accept it. And that was, it was such a big deal. And what was great, what was funny about that was Michael and I we made sure that we were on that night and we pulled out our best shit. Like we just were there to impress Wil so much. And it's funny, I think Tripod and Wil and some of those bigger acts that came along they'd just heard from people about this room. Kev would have told people about it. You know. It just got a bit of a word that it was a fun place to go and perform. And we loved that. What we loved was we would have someone doing their first ever gig and it'd be headlined by Wil or Tripod or someone like that. So getting back to how Michael and I were very good, organised boys.
PENNY: Well, someone was. And the other person was very dynamic.
CHARLIE: When we started the room everyone that performed, this was for about the first year, everyone that performed we gave them a letter like we had written a letter for all performers stating that we would book at headline that we could pay, and everyone else we said we can't always pay but we will pay you before we pay ourselves. And that was our rule, we would do a door-split and we would pay everyone else before we took any money ourselves. I have to find it, there was a letter of intent about what the room was going to be and why we were running it. And we gave that to everyone, and they understood and knew, it's like they knew where they stood with us and I think that was another thing that kind of set us apart a little bit.
PENNY: Because people, there's not always a lot of transparency in rooms. And often you didn't even know if you were going to get paid. Or what the deal was, it was a little bit like the end of a party where you go up
CHRISTINA: Hovering around awkwardly.
PENNY: Hovering. And you know, the kids parties and they're not meant to ask for the party bag but they just sort of stand there.
CHRISTINA: And you know, you would get free beers and hopefully with enough of them you'd forget that you were meant to get 20 bucks at the end of the night.
PENNY: But there was another musical element of the night that I think was very important and that was your theme song, which was theme song to 'Cheers'.
(piano plays first bar of Cheers theme song)
PENNY: How did you decide on that?
CHARLIE: That is 100 percent the perfect alchemy of Michael and my brains. We are kids who grew up watching 'Cheers' like that was just part of our heads. I had, I was teaching myself to use very early days Aftereffects, Adobe Aftereffects, which was like graphics software. So we're running this little production company and I'm trying to make cool titles and I taught myself how to animate basically. And then I was just looking at it going, 'I reckon I could make a, like a, sitcom title sequence here. And I said to Michael, 'What would you think if our room started with a sitcom intro and we used the them from 'Cheers'?' And he was just like, 'That's us. That's 100 percent us'. So it started, I almost remember it shot-for-shot. You might remember the start of the 'Cheers' credits has like a horse and cart going in front of the pub and then it pauses, turns black-and-white, zooms in and then we're in all these historical shots of the old pub. I set up a camera and I filmed like, it was like an '88 Mitzibishi Magda drove infrount of the pub and I filmed it and I had it pause, and turn to black-and-white and zoom in and then it went to shots of the first season of the Fringe Festival. There were shots of Lawrence Leung holding up a broken scooter.
PENNY: Oh, yes, I remember that.
CHARLIE: So Michael and I, all of these photos that had been taken from the first time we did it, I set it up and did titles like it was 'Cheers' and that became, that was how we started the room. So the evening would start when the lights went down and the video started, played 'Cheers' and we would start and then at the end of the night. This was how insanely nerdy we were, I would make a second lot where we would roll credits on the night, which had everyone who performed and it was the instrumental version from the end of 'Cheers'.
PENNY: That's beautiful.
CHARLIE: And there was once that Michael actually played the instrumental on clarinet on stage.
PENNY: Oh, that's right. Was that like a copyright violation? What's going on?
CHARLIE: I mean probably. Yeah, I think so
PENNY: Had you filled in the form?
CHARLIE: No, we did not fill in an APRA form. I can't remember the artist who did it now. I mean, that guy he bought a yaucht.
PENNY: Look, I'm not worried about him.
CHARLIE: He would have made a fortune. It was the highest rating show on TV.
PENNY: I'm not dobbing you in.
CHARLIE: And he brought out an extended version of it as a single that went to number 1. I know a bit too much about this song. So it's fine. He's fine. We made nothing off it.
PENNY: Look, I'm only asking cos I'm gonna learn how to play it on piano and play it.
(Cheers theme playing in background)
CHARLIE: It's funny, it was, once again a little bit of a statement of intent about what our room was. We want everyone who comes to see the show to feel like their part of it. And we knew all the punters. We knew most of them by name. Even when it got bigger and bigger and we'd have 120 people in, there'd be regulars that would be there early sitting at their regular tables, we knew who they were. All of the acts, we made friends with in some way. That was what we were trying to do, we were trying to make. As well as the selfish aspect of us just getting on stage enough to get better at what we were doing we wanted to have a place where people could be a part of comedy and not be intimidated and feel like a part of something.
CHRISTINA: Yeah, absolutely.
CHARLIE: Aw, good on us.
PENNY: It was lovely. Absolutely lovely.
CHARLIE: And then as soon as things went well, I cut everyone loose and went for gold.
(Piano music suddenly stops)
PENNY: You got what you wanted and you left everybody else behind. This Joe Cody guy, as you said,
CHARLIE: Mr Cody.
PENNY: Mr Cody. What a lovely man he's got the beautiful balconies, he's got the brass band. As we know.
CHARLIE: He's got a little area where you can set fire to you moustache at will.
CHRISTINA: Yep.
PENNY: Exactly. It's very welcoming but I did find another article and I forgot to warn you about this Christina, I apologise. This is from the Argus.
CHARLIE: We've just stepped up in newspapers right now.
PENNY: We're jumping ahead to 1900, and it's someone remembering
CHARLIE: How long's this podcast?
PENNY: This is the last article.
CHRISTINA: We're just clawing our way through the 20th century now.
44:33 PENNY: And it's titled "Rat catching expert's experiences".
"The rat with its ugly snout, prominent incisors and scaly tail has, on account of its reputation as a medium of spreading the bubonic plague, achieved a world-wide notoriety."
This is not coming out of nowhere. 1900 there was a bubonic plague outbreak.
CHARLIE: Was there?
PENNY: Yes, worldwide.
CHRISTINA: I was thinking the bubonic plague's well and truly over.
PENNY: No.
CHARLIE: I remember a Spanish Flu around that time.
PENNY: No, that's a bit later.
CHARLIE: The old buboes I thought were done.
PENNY: Killed millions of people world-wide.
CHRISTINA: Yeah, but what doesn't?
PENNY: Exactly, I mean I'm not worried. It came Australia mainly in Sydney. But people were worried, and people were worried about rats.
CHARLIE: People are right to be worried about rats. Let's not
CHRISTINA: Just in general.
CHARLIE: Let's not disabuse people of that notion. It's not all 'Ratatouille'.
PENNY: How do you feel about rats Christina?
CHRISTINA: I don't like them. I really don't like them.
PENNY: Okay, okay. We might be alright.
CHARLIE: I remember my wife went out and spent a night with a rat-catcher in New York. She was possibly going to write a piece about him.
CHRISTINA: They're supposed to be enormous.
PENNY: The rat catchers?
CHARLIE: The rat catcher was very big.
CHRISTINA: His BMI was way-off.
CHARLIE: But it's funny, he was waging a war. And it was like he went to war every night against the rats. And he gave the impression that if at any point we're not at full mobilisation against rats they will take over. And I imagine, like our city is cleaner and it's not as big and there's not as much trash and it's a bit more regulated than New York is, but I have a feeling
CHRISTINA: He was on to something
CHARLIE: That it's full court press against rats and that if you ever let up, you're in trouble.
PENNY: Yeah, I mean one thing that I read in this article and I'm not gonna read this section out but that apparently some of the rat catchers would not catch all the rats. Cos this is their job. You don't wanna go somewhere and catch all the rats.
CHRISTINA: You've gotta create supply and demand.
CHARLIE: That's interesting.
PENNY: So you catch most of the rats, you leave 10% behind, you come back
CHRISTINA: Come back next Thursday.
CHARLIE: Cos it appears to have worked for a number of months. 'It's not my fault they came back mate. That's you running a dodgy lot.'
PENNY: And then I told my dad this and he's like 'Oh yeah, that's like the rabbit catchers.' So this journalist went and found a very successful rat catcher and interviewed them about their job.
"Hugh Smith who had his traps set under the pier on Tuesday evening and was seated above smoking a cigarette answered a number of questions concerning his business."
CHARLIE: Great images. It's just painted a beautiful picture of this guy.
PENNY: Yeah, this is a good journalist this one.
"He said - "Some people say there's nothing in fishing until they try it. I say there's in art in it and so there is in rat-catching."
CHARLIE: Wow.
CHRISTINA: He's taking it seriously.
CHARLIE: Do you know that's a, it's odd that, I could be wrong, this is so nerdy
PENNY: I'll be the judge of that
CHARLIE: That sentence is a variation on a line from a book called 'The Complete Angler' which is from the 1800s in England and it's about a passion for fishing. There is a line in it, 'Fishing surely is an art and an art worth your learning'. And just the way he described it there that some say that fishing is an art and then applying the same to the rat catcher. I'm fascinated with this rat catcher.
CHRISTINA: Yeah, he's a deep rat catcher.
CHARLIE: I have a feeling as he dragged on a cigarette he's read a couple of little pocket volumes of things
PENNY: Yeah, that's very possible. Is comedy an art?
CHARLIE: Yeah. I'm going to quote someone else, someone who I would say is more foundational comedian. He was the comedian, I was into a number of comedians but he's the one that I heard that I was like, 'I'm gonna do comedy.' And it was Bill Hicks and he once said in an interview that, 'Comedy is an art, but it's the only art that could begin with the words "Are there any birthdays in tonight?"' And it's a humbling concept. It's an art, it's also a trade, and it's a craft.
PENNY: Is it a science?
CHARLIE: It's a, do you know what?
PENNY: It's not a science. I'll answer that for you Charlie, it's not a science.
CHARLIE: No, I don't think it's a science given the definition of what science is. But it is somewhere. I had a wonderful conversation with John Clark about a sketch that we had written, actually Tom and I doing a tribute to Clarke and Dawe, Tom Gleeson and I doing a tribute to Clarke and Dawe.
PENNY: Ah, lovely.
CHARLIE: We wanted to use the music from Clarke and Dawe and John Clarke owned the rights so I had to ask him in person. And we ended up having
PENNY: It's not the 'Cheers' theme.
CHARLIE: No, it's not. And we had this beautiful conversation about a sketch and when you write a sketch, when you write something and you know, you can feel it click into place, it's right. He said it's somewhere between poetry and physics. I feel that it's quite true. Physics, poetry and maths, like there is, when things, sometimes it's just random and, but sometimes when you build it and you grind at it and you get something to work, it is, you've discovered a truth that was there all along but you had to go through the process to get there.
PENNY: There are definitely connections of logic that remind me of maths in some ways. Have you read Lorin's memoir about her dad. Lorin Clarke?
CHARLIE: No, not yet.
PENNY: Oh my god, it's good. I read it the other day. It was so generous of her to share that relationship that she had with her dad.
CHARLIE: She's an incredible writer too. She's wonderful.
PENNY: Yeah, exactly. You just got the most wonderful impression of their family. Okay I'll keep reading about these bloody rats.
CHRISTINA: Bloody rats.
PENNY: Okay:
"I believe the rat is the most cunning of all animals,"
This is the rat-catcher talking.
CHARLIE: Except the human. Sorry, didn't mean. I cut you off so quickly.
PENNY: Or is it the mosquito?
CHRISTINA: Or is it the fox?
PENNY: Yeah.
CHARLIE: Mosquitoes aren't that cunning cos you just (whack sound). You're gone.
PENNY: No, it's just always the mosquito, like you know,
CHRISTINA: It's just that they're smuggling malaria.
PENNY: Yeah, exactly. They kill the most.
"I believe the rat is the most cunning of all animals and if you don't know something about his habits and his cunning you'll never do much good as a trapper."
That might be where I've been going wrong. Every night I'm out there with my fishing rod. Not catching any.
CHARLIE: But that is a common trope when it comes to rat catching, when it comes to understanding the mind of the rat. And if you've ever, I don't know if you've ever had an exterminator set up rat traps at your house, if you've ever had a rat problem or a mouse problem.
CHRISTINA: I've had a rat problem but I've never actually had an exterminator.
CHARLIE: You just did it with a sausage and a mallet.
CHRISTINA: Yep, and just got out there.
CHARLIE: Sat by a hole. Sausage and a mallet. Ready
CHRISTINA: Ready to go. I just had some bait stations happening.
CHARLIE: But it's funny, I had one who explained heaps about the mindset of the rat and the way they work.
CHRISTINA: Must be a real calling rat catching.
PENNY: And it's a real popular thing in literature as well the idea of the rat-catcher. There's quite a few books and stuff.
CHARLIE: Always pay your rat-catcher.
PENNY: Books and stuff, I'm like.
CHARLIE: Always pay your rat-catcher. Otherwise they will steal your children. That's the rules.
CHRISTINA: Or release rats into your bedroom.
CHARLIE: That's right. Aw, shit a brick.
CHRISTINA: You can take the children, just don't release the rats.
PENNY: I'll carry on:
"Melbourne is alive with rats,"
CHARLIE: Some of them are in a jazz band up on the balcony (trumpet sound).
PENNY: "Some years ago we used to trap from 300 to 400 rats a week for the rat - pits and we got 4 pence
CHARLIE: Hmmmm...what are the rat pits?
CHRISTINA: Yeah, what are the rat pits?
PENNY: I'll carry on:
"We got 4 pence and sometimes 6 pence a head for them. It paid us very well. But when the bad times came the sport was given up."
The bad times are the 1890s recession, I'm assuming.
CHARLIE: When people couldn't pay for a rat to be killed.
PENNY: You now what, in recessions people, their leisure is often the first thing to go. Their leisure activities.
CHARLIE: Yeah but lipsticks and stockings.
PENNY: They keep paying for those do they?
CHARLIE: It's like luxury items
PENNY: Yeah, little luxuries
CHARLIE: Little luxury feel-goods.
PENNY: Yes, ice-creams apparently do quite well.
CHRISTINA: But not the rats.
CHARLIE: I wear ice-cream as lipstick.
PENNY: The yummiest kind.
"Replying to a query as to the exact nature of the sport,"
Could have been your query.
"Smith said; - "There used to be rat-pits in Melbourne where sportsmen took their dogs and had competitions in rat killing."
CHRISTINA: Aw, that's gross.
"Joe Cody,"
CHRISTINA: Again!
PENNY: Our Renaissance man:
"of the Royal Derby Hotel Collingwood,"
CHARLIE: Excellent.
PENNY: "had one of the best pits and he took at least 300 rats a week from us. The pit was surrounded by plate-glass, six or twelve rats at a time were let into it by me, and two dogs were then put in and the test was to see which of them would kill the most in the quickest time."
CHRISTINA: Oh that's brutal.
CHARLIE: It's interesting. Michael and I, that's initially what we'd planned to do.
CHRISTINA: It just evolved a little from there.
CHARLIE: We just couldn't
PENNY: Just couldn't catch enough rats.
CHARLIE: And we had trouble building the plate-glass octagon.
CHRISTINA: People were reluctant to bring their dogs.
CHARLIE: Thank god TV came along.
PENNY: I know. But the rough terrriers club used to meet at the Derby.
CHARLIE: Oh, the Rough Terriers Club.
CHRISTINA: Not smooth.
PENNY: So it all makes sense. But do you reckon there's any parallels between what Joe Cody, the organisation that he would have had to put in.
CHARLIE: Absolutely.
PENNY: It's the same thing really, isn't it.
CHARLIE: You have to give the people what they want. 'Are you not entertained?' There is in that the nature of the pub as a centralised place of entertainment hasn't changed a lot and that is the same. And it's interesting, feeds into the two, three human compulsions to socialise, drink and be entertained.
PENNY: Yes. I think there's another one.
CHARLIE: Oh. Yeah. I getcha. Did any of that happen for.
PENNY: Not for me.
CHARLIE: Not at the Royal Derby for me either. Not specifically at the Royal Derby.
PENNY: "The sport was grand."
CHRISTINA: I bet it was.
PENNY: And when the say the sport, it was gambling. I mean they weren't just watching the rats and the dogs.
CHARLIE: People aren't that into watching horses run.
CHRISTINA: No, it's just about the gambling.
PENNY: "The hotelkeeper did well by it and the owners of the dogs enjoyed the sport. It helped to keep down the rats too and the sooner it is started again the better."
CHRISTINA: Excellent. Bring it back.
CHARLIE: I've always said that. I think that will be a feature piece on The Weekly. Bring back the rat-pits.
PENNY: "When we took, them to Joe Cody he wouldn't pay for them unless we handled each one, and satisfied him that it was lively and strong."
Now you did not do that with your acts at Stage Time.
CHARLIE: No, we did not.
PENNY: And that's why people liked the room.
CHARLIE: We had a strict no handling policy.
PENNY: "They were fine times, I tell you. We did something, to keep the rats down then, but now Melbourne and all the suburbs swarm with them and if the plague only gets amongst the rats it will spread all over the city."
Then, if the rat-pits are revived you will have no difficulty in supplying them?"
Asked the journalist.
""Oh! no; we could get hands to supply any number required."
And I don't know if that would have helped during COVID. Just opening the rat pits again.
CHRISTINA: And televise it.
PENNY: Yeah, feels like the answer to everything.
CHARLIE: I became fascinated during COVID with what was going on during curfew. Because I had this belief. This deeply held belief.
PENNY: There were underground
CHARLIE: Deeply held belief, just that all manner of nonsense was going on after curfew.
PENNY: I had no idea.
CHARLIE: And I would be unsurprised if there weren't a couple of
PENNY: Rat pits.
CHARLIE: Off the books rat pits that popped up.
PENNY: Were there any traces of the rat pit left at the Derby when you were there?
CHRISTINA: Literally or metaphorically?
CHARLIE: I mean metaphorically; us. But
PENNY: Not piles of rat tails?
CHARLIE: Nothing like that. But what I will say is there was definitely an underground chamber at the hotel, which a lot of pubs have
PENNY: That's where they keep the beer, isn't it?
CHARLIE: Yeah the trucks rock up and they drop the kegs down, they roll them down and they land on like a sandbag.
CHRISTINA: Gosh that's primitive isn't it?
CHARLIE: Yeah it is, but they haven't figured out another way around it. The reason I know that there is an underground area at the Royal Derby hotel is the trapdoor to get down to it was right next to the stage. In fact, part of the stage was over the trapdoor. And there was one night, it was like the 3rd manager we had who really didn't get show biz. And he opened the door, while the show's on, opened the trapdoor and started loading shit down.
CHRISTINA: Yes.
CHARLIE: I remember Michael being on stage just uterly baffled that anyone could. And the whold audience is just laughing their arses off, it was geuinely strange.
CHRISTINA: Like, what the hell?
CHARLIE: But my favourite ending to a Stage Time, it was the end of the night and Michael was hosting and I was running the lights and he started wrapping up the evening and thanking everyone for coming, getting a round of applause and as he's doing it, he slowly climbs down the ladder under the stage and stayed down there talking for like 10 minutes. So the stage was completely empty. He sang a song. And everyone. And there was something so insanely funny about watching an empty stage with just this mic lead going into the basement. So I remember that. That was my favourite end to a night at Stage Time.
PENNY: That's beautiful.
CHARLIE: Not the most memorable end to a night at Stage Time.
PENNY: Now, I don't know if we have enough time to talk about what was probably, I think was the most
CHARLIE: Well, we've gotta do it now.
PENNY: We've gotta do it now. Okay.
CHRISTINA: Get in there.
CHARLIE: Were you there?
PENNY: I was there. So it was September 11th 2001. We just had Stage Time. I was on, did very well. And
CHARLIE: Pre-attack.
CHRISTINA: Yeah.
PENNY: Charlie ran into the room. No I didn't get up after. No.
CHRISTINA: Well, this'll be tough to follow, but I'll give it a go.
PENNY: No, and then Charlie, I think you got the news?
CHARLIE: I got a text on my phone saying 'Turn on the TV now'. And this is as Michael is wrapping up the night and I was just on the sound decks. And I actually plugged in a microphone and said, 'Hey, Michael. Just got a text saying Turn on the TV now, do you wanna do it?' And they were like, 'What's it gonna be'. And they said 'Put channel 7 on now or whatever. And it was the end of the comedy night, been a great night. We turn on the TV and it's like one tower with smoke coming out and we were all just 'What?' and it really killed the comedy night. It did not help the comedy night at all.
CHRISTINA: Hysteria set in.
CHARLIE: But we stayed in the pub until like 7 in the morning. We stayed watching the TV all night, drinking. Like, they let us all stay there. And so we watch September 11 unfold in that room.
PENNY: I remember I went home, I lived with my sister and I woke her up and I said, 'Oh this terrible, terrible thing's happened' and she just didn't get it. And so she just went, 'Penny, I'm going back to sleep.'
CHRISTINA: I was, I can't remember what I'd been doing that evening but I was staying at my boyfriend at the time's house and yeah his housemate came running in like 'You've gotta come and look at this.' Yeah I guess there was this sense of 'What is going on?' And for some reason I felt the need to ring my parents in the middle of the night. I don't know, it promoted very strange responses.
CHARLIE: Amazing the urge to check on people.
CHRISTINA: I was like, 'Mum, Dad, you've gotta get up and watch.' Like what the hell?
CHARLIE: It was an incredible moment and I remember also very clearly how hard it was also one week later to put on a comedy night. Cos everyone was in a kind of paralysis.
CHRISTINA: The mood was not right for it.
CHARLIE: It was pretty tough. It was not a great gig the following week. Not only cos I'd finished the previous show by putting that on the TV. It was a terrible closer. I should have finished with the rat pit. It would have been much better.
PENNY: Yes, imagine if you'd wheeled out a little portable rat-pit.
CHARLIE: 'Dad, wake up, there's something on the news. There's been a terror attack in New York.' 'I'd better get the rats.'
CHRISTINA: How many rats will the terriers destroy?
PENNY: How long did Stage Time go for and why did it stop?
CHARLIE: It had a number of almost lives if that makes sense.
PENNY: But at the Royal Derby it was like only a year and a half, two years?
CHARLIE: It was 2 straight years at the Royal Derby and then I got a job in Sydney on Triple J, which just meant that we couldn't do that anymore. And then later on when I had moved back to Melbourne we ran it at the Prince Patrick Hotel, which I think is also, well it's Collingwood technically. And then the Prince Pat they stopped doing comedy there and we moved to Bar Open and we ran it there, probably for a couple of years there. We had some huge shows like Flight of the Concords. We blew all of our money flying Flight of the Concords over.
PENNY: You flew them over? But but they're meant to fly themselves.
CHARLIE: They stayed on my couch. We went through that. It stopped and we kind of just made a decision that we had to move on. Like it was just kind of done. So we'd kind of run it at Bar Open and then we put on one last gig, which we put on at the Spanish Club and it was a farewell gig and we got something like 600 people in. Like it was enormous and it was a really big show.
PENNY: So you've had a farewell gig, but are you gonna reunite?
CHARLIE: Well, I mean, I think the biggest progress that Michael and I have made is that he's the head writer on the Weekly now. And he has been for the last 2 years.
PENNY: Oh, fantastic.
CHARLIE: And so, we are
PENNY: When you say the biggest progress that you've made?
CHARLIE: I'd say the biggest progress also cos also coming out of Stage Time and everything that, and we had a double act called Boiling Point we did some comedy festivals doing sort of new satire type stuff. We got a Comedy Channel show out of that, which was drastically under-funded and we worked like 20 hours a day. And the night before we filmed our last episode we had our first ever fight and it was enormous.
PENNY: (gasps)
CHARLIE: But it was like, it was just a disagreement. Probably ten years of rubbing. Actually ten years of loving working together but there would be things about him that I didn't like and there were heaps of things about me that drove him fucking crazy. And so there was a point we just had big blow-up and it was interesting it was just like we finished the show, didn't get renewed and then we just kind of took a couple of years off talking. But it wasn't like we were feuding it's like we both just knew
CHRISTINA: Just needed a break
CHARLIE: We needed a break. And if you talk to anyone who has been in a duo of any kind, it is the worst structure. It's a terrible decision making structure because there's noone at the top to make the call so everything has to be a negotiation, a battle. You know, like. And it means that compromise is hard. Sometimes it means quality because you only do the things you both agree on, which means you've got a harder bar to clear, but it also just means that there's noone else you can go, 'what's the fuck with this guy'. You know, you, and it's been an amazing creative relationship but we just had time apart and Michael went off and did amazing stuff and wrote and has done great standup and festivals and I've done whatever it is that I've done. And now we're back together and it's actually great it's like we're just there, the pressure on it is different. It's not personal pressure anymore. It's not that incubator of our whole lives are each other.
PENNY: So are you the boss now?
CHARLIE: I mean technically.
PENNY: Technically.
CHARLIE: But it's funny, and this has kind of always been the case with Michael and I. We both have a very, we've both got the same idea of what good is. So whether it's a joke or an idea or something. I can be rewriting one of his scripts and we'll do it at a table with two laptops across from each other. And
PENNY: You won't make the same edits?
CHARLIE: We won't make the same edits. But I'll change a line and he'll go, 'That's it.' And it's the same with him. He'll come up with a line and I go, 'That's it. Got it. Can't wait to say that.' We've always had the same idea of what good is. Whether it's what a good comedy room was or what a good joke was or what we wanted to see in something good. And in the acts that we would book that was our idea of what good was.
PENNY: Yeah, so it's not like
CHARLIE: So booking you for example Penny was exactly that about. We loved all your jokes start to finish when we saw you at Raw Comedy. And we were like, that's our idea of what a good new comic is.
PENNY: Hmmm. A couple of them were a bit problematic actually. When I look back on them
CHARLIE: I remember them being deeply racist.
CHRISTINA: Yeah, I mean that was a phase you went through.
PENNY: No, it was more ableist actually.
CHARLIE: You cancelled. So I recorded a special, I've only recorded one special and it was ages ago and it was hotch potch of various material. It was fine. It was, is what it is. But then it was kind of, it was sold to a network where they would put it on late at night, whatever, and that was fine. And then there was a point where it was gonna be on again and I thought about the material and how the world moves on. I was like there are three bits of material that have to come out before that goes to air because I'm gonna get cancelled for something I said 12 years ago.
CHRISTINA: When it make sense.
CHARLIE: When I was a white supremacist. But no, it is funny, but I love the fact that that is the case. Like thinking back to maybe Stage Time was the early vanguard of what an inclusive room might look like and we still had no concept of what not inclusive spaces were like. And i like the fact that now comedy is inclusive that there is a platform for everyone to be funny. And I always have felt that the audience will decide. And the lesson we learned at Stage Time is the lesson they learned running a rat pit. Not that the morality of the audience is right but an audience decides. And they will always decide. And the people that you hear complaining that comedy's too woke, they're the people that can't get an audience to go see them and laugh at them anymore. And it's not because we've stolen some magic trick from them that they had. It's cos their jokes actually weren't funny, they relied on a whole bunch of things that people don't laugh at anymore.
PENNY: The idea that you should have, there's no tenure. You're not a professor. The industry changes, trends change and if you can't change with it then you might find yourself at some points
CHRISTINA: Redundant
PENNY: Yeah.
CHARLIE: Yeah, it's entirely true.
PENNY: And you can stay true to yourself and those jokes that other people don't like and you can do that but you can't expect
CHARLIE: You do it at your own peril.
CHRISTINA: Perform at the mirror.
CHARLIE: No one has the right to an audience. No one deserves, you know like, no-one's entitled to an audience.
PENNY: But thank you so much. I was so thrilled when you said you'd come, because I love reminiscing about the olden days.
CHARLIE: But this has been a wonderful insight too into the life of a working pub in the 1800s and early 1900s. There's something quite magical about it.
PENNY: And like there's so many pubs just in Fitzroy. I there was, up to 1905, something like 94 pubs.
CHARLIE: Gee whiz.
PENNY: So every single pub would have these same kind of stories.
CHARLIE: Absolutely. And it's funny, this one it's like I'm sure it was quite nice for its day. I mean, Mr Cody ran a respectable establishment.
CHRISTINA: The balconies and the brass band
CHARLIE: (makes trumpet noise) But it's the feeling, that visceral feeling of what a different place the past was but also there's something quite reassuring about the fact that human beings were human beings. Like we haven't evolved that much.
CHRISTINA: No.
CHARLIE: I mean Penny can't roll out the same ableist gear that she used to.
CHRISTINA: It's good that you moved on from that.
PENNY: Look, know better, do better that's always the motto. You learn stuff, you change what you're doing.
CHARLIE: Thank you so much for having me.
PENNY: No, thank you for coming.
1:08:55 (Cheers theme followed by jaunty piano theme).
CHARLIE: And while we were like ragging on the initial article as being obvious paid advertorial, Thanks Trove. Good on you Trove.
PENNY: We love Trove. All the lovely people at the National Library of Australia and all their very hard work that they do.
CHARLIE: If only all the deep pocketed sponsors in the world were public institutions like libraries. Wouldn't it be great to be in the pocket of Big Trove.
CHRISTINA: Treasure Trove.