Cori Gonzalez-Macuer presentsPromo Girls Aren’t Models
The Classic Studio, 321 Queen St, Auckland
02/05/2009 - 09/05/2009
Fringe Bar, Cnr Cuba & Vivian, Wellington
19/05/2009 - 23/05/2009
NZ International Comedy Festival 2007-09, 2013
Production Details
While some people do anything for their 15 minutes of fame, Cori will do anything to take the piss out of them.
In a world obsessed with fame and all things superficial, one man is keeping it real. After spending the last couple of years working in the entertainment industry, Cori Gonzalez-Macuer has been witness to the lengths some people will take in order to be famous. Whether it’s promo girls sleeping with rugby league players, ex NZ Idol competitors having public holidays named after them or former sports starts milking their fame for all it’s worth, celebrity has a way of making any idiot think they can make it to the big time. Promo Girls Aren’t Models will expose the seedier side of New Zealand’s celebrity culture.
Billy T Award winning comedian, Cori Gonzalez-Macuer, returns to the New Zealand International Comedy Festival with a brand new show. The last year has seen him perform all over the country as well as being a writer and presenter on C4’s award winning Jono’s New Show (Best Entertainment Show – 2008 Qantas Film and TV Awards). With more live stand-up and TV projects in the works, Promo Girls Aren’t Models will be a great taster of what Cori has in store for the comedy public in the months to come.
Comedy Festival sell-out in 2008
Proudly supported by The Rock (The radio station. Not the wrestler. Although he seems like he would support the arts).
"The future of NZ Comedy" NZ Herald
"Fantastic *****" BBC4 UK
"F****n funny" texture.co.nz
AUCKLAND
Dates: 2 May, 4-9 May 2009
Venue: The Classic Studio
Tickets: $23/$18
Bookings: 0800 TICKETEK
WELLINGTON
Dates: 19 May-23 May 2009
Venue: Fringe Bar
Tickets: $23/$18
Bookings: 0800 TICKETEK
Substance by stealth
Review by John Smythe 21st May 2009
The pre-show ‘music’ at The Fringe Bar is of the genre that layers everything over everything else so that what one assumes are lyrics, possibly well crafted (who would know?), are obliterated by the melange of noise that emanates from devices that, in another context, might fairly be called musical instruments. Its immediate effect is to have friends shouting at each other over their drinks in their vain attempts to converse. Maybe the real purpose is to make us intuitively welcome the coherent sound of one unencumbered voice at the stand up mic.
Meanwhile, for visual interest, we see a projected montage of ‘promo girls’ in various locations and poses, as background to the title: Promo Girls Aren’t Models. Not that Cori Gonzales Maceur acknowledges it in arrival.
His opening shtick is mostly about what an awkward human being he is, proved by a series of anecdotes. Then it’s growing up in Chile and our cultural differences when it comes to weapons of protection and NZ rugby v Sth American football fan behaviour. A good intro.
Promo Girls Aren’t Models turns out to be a metaphor for people who think they are cool but are not, and later, via some day-in-the-life mockumentary footage – involving the Rock FM crew and his flatmate Jared – Maceur includes himself in that category: a legend in his own showreel.
His Promo Girls rant is apparently provoked by a three-month relationship with one. Here he gets to say stuff about women – well this woman, anyway – that justifies and/or answers the anti-male stuff Melody Nixon mentions in her Comedy Divas review. And the good thing is the women in the audience laugh as long and loud as anyone; not least a group that could well be Promo Girls themselves.
Fame is another theme, allowing him to discuss – with PowerPoint backup – people who don’t want to be famous but are, and NZ’s Top Five Falls From Grace.
Maceur’s self-effacing manner and his graphically illustrated assessment of his own erratic trajectory conceal a cunning comic who delivers substance by stealth in that downbeat way many Kiwi comedians seem to favour nowadays.
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