Comedy Festival Melbourne

British comedians Max & Ivan have returned to Australia to launch their new show at the 2015 Melbourne International Comedy Festival. We sat down with the hilarious duo to discuss their upcoming comedy tour, their opinion of Melbourne, and some tips on how to avoid a ‘travel horror-fest’.

“It’s so much fun to perform here … the people are lovely and the audiences are brilliant. It’s a lovely comedy savvy place, brilliantly curated festival. The coffee is awesome, the people are lovely and the food is delicious. You’ve got a thing called ‘sun’ over here, which we appreciate”

– Max, commenting on why he loves to perform in Melbourne.

Max and Ivan, an award winning British comedy double act, are performing at the 2015 Melbourne International Comedy Festival to launch the world premier season of their show – a bewitching and dramatic new sketch-comedy tale. “The two of us play a dazzling array of characters without the aid of any props or special costumes”, Max revealed during our chat. And why do they keep coming back to light up the stages of Melbourne? “Because it’s the second biggest comedy festival … but first in our hearts”, says Max.

As successful comedians, Max and Ivan do a lot of travelling and they appreciate how lucky they are to travel for a job they love. “Any time we get to travel for our job it feels like an extraordinary thing, hop on a plane and travel to the other side of the world in order to tell some jokes, put on silly voices and do some acting. It feels like an absolute triumph. We love it all”, they both enthuse.

With many travel miles under their belts, the duo must have some great stories to tell. Max recalls a “terrifying budget [travel] option” that he will never revert to again as long as he lives:

“If you feel the urge to travel from London to Edinburgh, there are many ways you can go. The one way I would not recommend is the overnight mega bus which I travelled on. It was a 12 hour horror-fest in an overstuffed bus, the toilet of which broke within the first 10 minutes of us getting on the bus. It was deeply, deeply upsetting. I look back at that and laugh now, but at the time I wasn’t sure if I would make it to Edinburgh at all.”

And the advice kept coming. Max’s tip for all international travellers is to remember your sunglasses when travelling to Australia, “I didn’t bring any shades the first time I came to Melbourne, and I’ve probably overcompensated by bringing four pairs this time.”

Thinking of travelling to Tasmania? Ivan’s advice may come in handy, “Don’t take any fruit or vegetables into Tasmania because they have sniffer dogs there and they will confiscate your fruit and veg.”

Max was fast to eleborate … “Sadly Ivan was wearing a Carmen Miranda style tropical fruit hat at the time and the dog was going berserk. He was taken aside for two hours to be interrogated.” Thanks for the heads up guys.