Chris Parker wants to throw his phone off the Harbour Bridge

On August 23, Parker will perform his comedy special Give Me One Good Reason Not to Throw Your Phone Off a Bridge at the ASB Waterfront Theatre.
photo: New Zealand International Comedy Festival

Comedian Chris Parker’s cell phone helps him a lot, but he still has the urge to throw it off the highest bridge he can find.

This is the theme of Parker’s upcoming winter comedy special Give me one good reason not to throw your phone off a bridgehe will perform two shows at the ASB Waterfront Theatre in August.

Parker has been in the comedy world for a long time, but his Instagram posts — sometimes impressions of his mom, other times woodland animals he made out of felt — have launched him into a new era of success. The Tashi Family So Omaro Schwalger.

“I’m addicted to my phone, but I also need it to work. I’m so grateful for the huge audience I have in New Zealand, and that’s thanks to my Instagram… This show is a bit of a mental battle between wanting to throw my phone off the Harbour Bridge but also being so grateful for Instagram.”

Parker created the show earlier this year and has performed it for audiences across Australia and New Zealand as part of the New Zealand International Comedy Festival – the upcoming encore is part of the festival’s winter special.

He said the show gets better and better as time goes on.

“There’s a lot of stuff going on here, you know, underneath it all, there’s a general sense of loneliness and isolation that everybody feels, and that sense of wanting and needing to connect, and we connect digitally, which is why I’m always going back to my phone to see what my friends are doing. They’re all in London, they’re all in Melbourne, making more,” he laughed.

“That’s why I’m constantly on my phone, and I’m just trying to recalibrate my relationship with my phone so that I’m not just constantly browsing and feeling miserable.”

Parker said developing the show and seeing how different audiences are receptive are all part of the process — he’ll start by testing material on small shows and then work his way up.

“I’ll write down ideas in a notes app and practice them in front of an audience who’ll have a couple of drinks, just to lighten the mood, but I rarely write like that… I have a lot of stories to tell and I’ll write down my jokes, you know, that’s what I do when you’ve got a really funny story to tell at the dinner table.

“You talk about it a few times and you feel like, actually, I’ll get a better payoff if I tweak it here, build suspense here, and I’ll do something like this… But there’s no better inspiration than a tight deadline.”

At the Australian show, the crowd was about 200. In New Zealand, it could be more than 2,000. Parker said audiences can react differently to jokes, but not for the reasons you might think.

“I think because we live in such a global world, everyone is online, everyone has the same references, everyone has seen everyone else. Swim in the SeineEverybody sees Trump, we know everything. I find that people have different attitudes towards different generations, and now everyone’s algorithms limit them to certain areas, and it’s always interesting what people reference.

“Maybe one thing that’s a little different is that I play shows all over New Zealand, in more densely populated metropolitan areas and in smaller rural towns, and the differences there are quite interesting, and it takes a lot of work to get the same show to land in those very specific environments.

“That’s where the pressure builds, when you think, okay, Hawke’s Bay, I like them but I’ve never been here, I’ve never played a gig here, how are they going to accept this… but I really try to make contact.”

But comedy alone isn’t enough, you also need a strong social media strategy to make this work. That’s where Parker excels.

“The reason I’m doing two shows is because I’m going to film the shows and then edit them into shorts. The content cycle is that you create the material, you perform the show, and then you edit it into a 60-second short that Mark Zuckerberg will eventually profit from. That’s what I’m going to do, and I’m really excited about it. Of course, there’s a lot of pressure, and I’m going to give it my all and make it look great because it will live on the Internet forever.

“If you haven’t seen it, I honestly think it’s one of my funniest shows… I’m going to be sad not to watch it more often because I’ve filmed so much and there are so many jokes in it. It’s cool to be able to film it and there are clips that I’m excited to post online, but comedy is funnier in real life. It’s a lot funnier than watching it on your phone.”

Parker is performing Give me one good reason not to throw your phone off a bridge It will be at the ASB Waterfront Theatre on August 23, with re-performances at 6.30pm and 8.30pm. Tickets are available at comedyfestival.co.nz.