Nine Lessons for Melbourne Wrap Up
Here's what went down at the first official international Nine Lessons show!
We couldn’t be sure what an international audience would make of our Nine Lessons mayhem that has become an annual tradition in the UK for the past 18 years of so, but if the sold out audience and the huge lines at the bookshop after are anything to go by, we will definitely be back!
It was such a fun night at The Capitol as part of the Melbourne International Comedy Festival and our thanks to all the tech crew who tackled a show not quite like any others in the festival, and to the wonderful audience that came along!
If you couldn’t make it, possibly because you were in the UK, here’s what went down!
The show began with an acknowledgement of country from our Australian born producer Trent Burton, leading into a Shambles highlight reel featuring everything from Clara Nellist talking about weasels, Robin Ince screaming in a library and Natalie Haynes talking about snake legged goddesses that, while meant to introduce Shambles to a new international audience, arguably confused them more.
Our MC for the evening was standup mathematician Matt Parker, who took the stage and kicked things off by admiring the fractal patterns of the ceiling, and told the audience that the show’s creator, Robin Ince, was the usual host but he couldn’t be there. Robin then joined us live on screen to critique the technology, perform a poem and introduce our first surprise guest of the night.
And it’s our good pal from the UK, Kiri Pritchard-McLean. The previous show at the theatre that evening was the wonderful podcast All Killa, No Filla, co-hosted by Kiri, so she stuck around to open the show up with tales of Wales.
Following Kiri was our first scientist of the night, physicist Prof Suzie Sheehy. As a Senior Lecturer in Accelerator Physics at the University of Melbourne, she filled the audience in on the top questions she has been asked by men online and on dates about particle physics including, ‘What would happen if I stuck my head in the LHC?’
Next it was time for our first musical guest and it was the brilliant Jess Hitchcock, who joined a couple of our online shows (Stay at Home Festival) during the pandemic, and she performed two of her incredibly beautiful songs including By the Sea that she also performed us as part of our Sea Shambles show in 2020.
Maths was up next and Matt got the audience involved with a puzzle game involving thousands of possible random combinations. The audience solved both puzzles quickly, due to the weight of numbers, whilst Matt struggled with the second (ahem).
As is tradition at Nine Lessons, we like to have a reading, be it a science text, or perhaps a Christmas ghost story, performed by a very special surprise guest. Nine Lessons for Melbourne was no different. Comedy legend Shaun Micallef took to the stage to perform readings of six genuine letters written by Charles Darwin. At times it’s hard to know if they were Micallef originals, or genuinely written by Darwin, but we promise, they’re all real! He opted for a John Geilgud performance, because a Shropshire accent seemed too awkward, but it evolved (pun intended) into some sort of Christopher Walken - Marx Brothers hybrid. It was informative, chaotic, hilarious and Nine Lessons to a tee.
Next along, it’s time to look to the stars. Krystal De Napoli, a Gomeroi woman and astrophysicist who joined us online for the 24 hour edition of Nine Lessons in 2021 took us on a quick tour of The Dark Universe via some indigenous astronomy, black holes and Nick Cave…
On next to national treasure, Dr Karl. We could not do a Nine Lessons in Australia without our ole pal Dr Karl, it just wouldn’t be right. He rattled through 10 plus minutes of bizarre science headlines and stories of his university days. As ever, he could fill hours with scientific tales, but alas we had to move on.
The final act of the night continued another Nine Lessons and Compendium tradition, the surprise musical finale. Paul Dempsey is Australian Music Royalty for his solo career, his work with new duo Fanning Dempsey National Park and as the lead singer and guitarist of the 11 time ARIA Award nominated alt rock band, Something For Kate. Paul is also a self proclaimed science nerd and performed two barnstorming love songs inspired by reading about the multiverse and physics.
To wrap up, Matt returned to thank everyone for coming and give them a little info about our charity partners Two Wheels for Life, for whom profits from the show would go to support. As with our London shows, there was also a local independent bookshop, Yarraville’s The Sun Bookshop, set up in the foyer to satisfy the curious minds leaving the venue.
At two hours it was one of the shortest Nine Lessons ever, but we hope to be back soon with a full edition of the show!
View a full gallery of the show here.