A trio of Irish stand-up comedians bring Celtic humour to Hong Kong
Three Irish comedians are here to paint the town green, writes P. Ramakrishnan
Hong Kong comedy fans will have a bit of the luck of the Irish when three comics from the Emerald Isle, P.J. Gallagher, Keith Farnan and Andrew Stanley, take to the stage of the Punchline Comedy Club this month.
And the Gaelic proverb "when the tongue slips, it speaks the truth" is sure to resonate as the funny men put their spin on life as we know it.
Gallagher is perhaps the best known of the trio. As the star of television shows Next Week's News and Naked Camera he has found fans beyond Ireland. "My first TV series, Naked Camera, was a hidden-camera show set in Dublin and it was the best fun I've ever had," Gallagher says.
"I love making TV shows and being part of a team working together to make something. Stand-up comedy is great, but you are always ultimately on your own and hoping for the best. With TV you really get the feeling that you are building something and can always revisit it, I love that side of it. I also like the idea that you are performing to people in their own houses. It's like a personal little show that everyone can be a part of."
In his current show, two of the more popular characters have been a mentally unstable taxi driver and the wickedly fun "Dirty Auld One", an elderly woman who makes wildly inappropriate sexual innuendoes. It's obvious that Gallagher finds inspiration in both the marvellous and the mundane.
"My family is very funny, but they have no idea. I suppose the funniest people never really think they're funny and they can even get angry if you point it out to them," he says. "My mother is the funniest person I've ever met, mad as a box of frogs too, but I'd never change her.