Denise Scott is certainly one of a kind. She is one of the funniest women in the country, a familiar face on our TV screens, and a best-selling author. Here we chat with her about her early days, her comedy and acting careers, and how she forged her path into a somewhat unknown space. And she did it her way.
EARLY DAYS
Jo Corrigan: Tell us about your early days.
Denise Scott: I was a secondary drama teacher and hated it. Then I had a head-on car accident and when the cars hit I thought “I’m gonna die and I’m gonna a fucking teacher!” Once I realised no-one had been hurt I decided I’d quit teaching. I remember one teacher saying “You’ll be back” and I remember thinking “No I won’t”, and I haven’t. Only a couple of times I’ve worked for the man since. I also decided not to drive again because I was shithouse at it!
JC: You met your husband John in a clown troupe, is that right?
DS: [After teaching] I got a job with a children’s theatre company and then in an adult clown troupe in Albury. John was in it and that’s where we met. I have got a beauty in John. He can only dare to suggest what I might do!
LIFE AS A STAND-UP COMEDIAN
JC: Did you always want to go into stand up?
DS: No. I’d done some performing in theatre restaurants in Melbourne. One of the women I worked with in the clown troupe, Lynda Gibson, had forged ahead in the comedy scene in Melbourne and invited me to resurrect an act we’d done in Albury. We formed the Natural Normans with Lynda, Lynne McGranger, Sal Upton & myself. We dressed as men and sang sexist songs about women. Really it was a lot of fun swaggering around stage like we were a man. That was my introduction to the comedy scene in Melbourne. We got invited to the Edinburgh Festival [but] you fund yourself and I had two small children so I couldn’t go. That is when I started doing stand-up because I thought I’m not going to head off and leave my kids. And so with great trepidation I went off to do that. Joan Rivers ‘Can We Talk?’ [was] out at that time and I remember thinking here’s a woman who’s fifty and doing it, this could be a long term plan.
JC: Has there been a time when you have thought you have ‘really made it’?
DS: It was palpable during the [2014] Comedy Festival when I won the Barry Award. The Barry Award is the best show in the festival and there was like four hundred and twenty shows. It usually goes to a male, overseas artist. That’s when I felt like this is incredible and yah-fucking-hoo!
JC: And when it’s not going so well?
DS: I’ve been through many times when I’ve been really disappointed for whatever reason and you get through it. You move on and literally forget it. I’ve had some absolute shockers and at the time it’s like you’re being crushed physically. But I know that in twenty four hours the pain will begin to subside and within about forty eight hours you won’t think about it much and within a week you probably don’t think about it at all.
I think in a way I always used my kids and my mum as a bit of an excuse for not deliberately doing the work required but now I know that all I really have to focus on is really doing the best job I can in whatever it is I’m doing. On the whole it usually works out fine if I have done that.
FROM COMEDY TO DRAMA
JC: What lead you from comedy into drama?
DS: The first producer of Winners and Losers, Maryanne Carroll, was very involved in comedy and it was her idea. I had to audition four times…people further up the chain weren’t convinced and fair enough. I wasn’t either.
JC: What is your favourite, doing stand-up or acting?
DS: I don’t think you can stay in Australia and just do one thing, there is just not enough work. So I like to mix it up. I like being on stage telling stories and making people laugh.
BOOKS
JC: Tell us about your books.
DS: I’ve written two memoirs. I found those quite a torturous process but I really enjoyed the outcome. Writing a memoir, you just get so tired of yourself. But I did resolve things. It’s interesting because I thought there really was a story to tell, and then in trying to write it, I realised there wasn’t really – a lot of it had gone on in my head. My Mum died the year I wrote the book and I realised I hadn’t been able to write it while she was alive. Mum was so intensely private, she couldn’t stand what I did. She thought that you shouldn’t talk about anything in public, whereas I talk about everything. Oddly, I think that became the reason I started getting work and interesting gigs because that’s all I do.
KEEPING THINGS GOING
JC: How do you keep your enthusiasm going?
DS: For years I felt absolutely tortured by {my work}. I never enjoyed it. I think the thing that kept me going was stubbornness but I said “I’m gonna be a stand-up comedian and I’m damn well gonna do it!” It wasn’t until I wrote the first book and I got to tell those stories, properly write them down [that] I found out they translated onto stage pretty well…I am so glad that I have actually got to enjoy my work before I retire. If I’m not actually working, I’m doing crochet or lying on the bed. That’s how I prepare for a gig. I may appear to be laying on the bed vaguely looking off into the distance but I’m actually almost shutting down and saving everything I’ve got for the gig. The way I work, I do like improvising so I like to be as mentally prepared as possible, open to whatever’s gonna come out!
ADVICE FOR THOSE STARTING OUT
JC: What advice do you have for someone starting out in a new career or direction?
DS: [Like] Susan Jeffers says, feel the fear and do it anyway. In my case perseverance paid off. I think it does in some way, whether it’s I gave it a go and it didn’t work or it’s wow! The thing with comedy is that you can’t really train for it or really learn about it, you just have to go out on stage and do it. I think be kind to yourself and learn from your failures. Understand that no-one else gives a shit, mostly they will never give it another thought.
“Now I know that all I really have to focus on is really doing the best job I can in whatever it is I’m doing.”
~ Denise Scott ~
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