In 2004 comedian Judith Lucy started work in the high profile Breakfast shift on Sydney radio station 2DAY-FM. By the year’s end she’d been demoted to drive time and sent back to Melbourne. Six months later, she was sacked. Most people would probably try and put such a painful experience behind them, but not Judith. She’s turned the whole affair into a comedy show, which suggests that she’s either extremely resilient, or one hell of a tough cookie.
“Either that or I’m an idiot with no imagination,” she opines drolly, “who always has to talk about the things that have happened to her, and you know; considering my personal life has actually been going quite well for a change it’s just as well the career has fucked up.”
Even when she was in the thick of things in Sydney, Lucy says that she was already joking on-air about doing a show called ‘I Failed!’ once she wrapped up her radio career.
“I’d already come up with that title before they’d even sacked me! Maybe I’m a little more psychic than I actually realised.”
The Melbourne-based comedian has been performing solidly since 1989, when she started her stand-up career at Le Joke. The following years saw her appearing in the cult ABC television series The Late Show, while more recently she graced cinema screens in the films Crackerjack and Bad Eggs.
‘I Failed’ is her first show at the Melbourne Comedy Festival since 2002. It had its world premiere (a concept which Lucy finds quite hilarious: “It’s not like I’m taking it to Egypt,” she laughs) at the Adelaide Fringe Festival earlier this year, and opens in Melbourne next week.
“Basically the show is me talking about my eighteen months on commercial radio; but it would also be fair to say I don’t just talk about radio, because if the show was just a whinge-fest for over an hour I don’t think that would be incredibly entertaining for anyone,” she says wryly.
Lucy is forthright in admitting that she may not have been the best person to do breakfast radio.
“By calling the show ‘I Failed!” I guess I’m taking a fair amount of responsibility for that,” she says, “but what made me angry was when they moved us from Sydney Breakfast to National Drive, which was certainly rating a whole lot better, and then they sacked us. If they’d sacked us while we were doing Breakfast I actually would have understood.”
Overall, Judith Lucy seems far from upset about the direction that her life has taken despite her very public sacking.
“People kept telling me it was the jewel in the crown,” she quips about losing the high profile position as a Sydney Breakfast host. “Not by the time I was finished with it; it was a fake old diamante in a party hat.”
Judith Lucy’s ‘I Failed!’: Thursday 13 April – Sunday 7 May, The Supper Room at Melbourne Town Hall
Bookings: Ticketmaster or www.comedyfestival.com.au
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