Rhysently Random

[size=133:jqevk3f9]What Murray did next: Kiwi stand-up comic Rhys Darby steps out of the shadows of Flight of the Conchords

[size=100:jqevk3f9]He stars in a hit TV show, upstaged Jim Carrey in his silver-screen debut and has just completed a sold-out series of stand-up gigs in London. So why is it Rhys Darby still only gets recognised once he's opened his mouth?

By Robert Epstein
Sunday, 9 August 2009


Hold on to your glasses: Darby's set is typically a physical affair
ANNIE COLLINGE

[size=100:jqevk3f9]Generally when I open my mouth, people recognise my voice. I normally wear a hat and glasses, not for a disguise, just for..."
Your trademark look? "
Yeah! It sort of became my thing."
Fame has not come easily to Rhys Darby. Indeed, the name might not even mean much to you now – but take a quick look at that picture to the right. Ring any bells? A little bit. A little bit, eh?

That line, delivered as something of a catchphrase in the 35-year-old New Zealander's distinctive, slightly nasal intonation, would surely be the giveaway to anyone who has caught his turn as the well-meaning but inept band manager Murray Hewitt on cult HBO comedy Flight of the Conchords (shown here on BBC4). But while his fellow Conchorders Bret McKenzie and Jemaine Clement became instantly recognisable (thanks in no small part to some prodigious facial hair), Darby left the set of the first series to go back to his first love of stand-up, performing in tiny gigs in student pubs in Wales, because "
I didn't know Conchords was going to be a success. We thought it was a bit too novelty for it to be as big as it's got."
How big? Big enough to catch the eye of the Hollywood director who gave Darby his first taste of the silver screen – but we are getting ahead of ourselves.

Darby's inability to predict the success of the show may well stem from a character trait he says is germane to his countrymen, of not believing in themselves ("
It comes from living on a small island in the South Pacific, the furthest away from anyone, and us looking to the rest of the world rather than anyone looking in"
) – a trait that meant Darby had to struggle in his early years just to get up on stage. "
No one in New Zealand did stand-up until 15 years ago,"
he reveals. "
We didn't get our own purpose-built comedy club until 1996 – and we've still only got the one, in Auckland."


Indeed, the greats of New Zealand stand-up are far from household names here – and even struggled to get by on their funny bones at home. Billy T James, after whom the country's most prestigious comedy award is named, was an iconic Maori entertainer, but he had to rely on his all-round repertoire of singin', dancin' and paintin' talents to be given a much-loved TV show in the 1980s (Hang on: paintin'? "
Yeah, he was a bit like Rolf Harris,"
explains Darby) – and his fame travelled no further than Australia. Similarly, John Clarke, whose portrayal of country farmer Fred Dagg endeared him to the nation in the early 1970s, left for Oz at the height of his fame "
because New Zealand didn't really know what to do with him;
we were too conservative to give him his own show"
.

Lacking a heritage into which he could tap, Darby helped found a stand-up scene in Christchurch while at university. "
I was part of a troupe called Four Fingers Missing. We'd go to local pubs and ask if we could perform. We weren't asking for money, just a chance to try out our stuff. And the reaction back then was, 'Who do you think you are? Here we go, we've got some Billy Connollys here.' New Zealanders just didn't think we [as a people] were capable of doing anything like that. Of course, we went on stage, did our stories, some surreal stuff, some songs, and people started to say, 'Ah, you're not too bad, actually... we'll buy you a beer.'"


The scene grew to the extent that New Zealand now hosts an international comedy festival every year. "
And we've got at least five or six comics now!"
The global triumph of Conchords has helped in no small part. "
Although we had those few home-grown comedy heroes like Billy T, it was only after crossing the border and having the rest of the world go, 'Oh my God, you guys are funny,' that New Zealand went, 'OK, we'll accept it now, maybe we can do it.'"


This shifting sense of confidence has itself proven a rich seam that Darby has mined in both his stand-up and his screen roles. His "
Imagine That!"
stand-up tour of last year was filled with his own tacit acknowledgement of his talents followed immediately by self-deprecation ("
Thanks for the applause on the helicopter [impersonation] there. Do you need friends when you can do that...? You do. I used to do it when I was a kid and my friends just thought I was a dick,"
) while Conchords' Murray Hewitt is a character who "
has this new-found confidence, but with all these back-of-the-head insecurities"
– his heartbreaking ode to the "
leggy blonde"
using the office photocopier during the second series of Conchords being a case in point. His first big-screen role, as Jim Carrey's fancy-dress-obsessed boss in Yes Man was similarly endearingly nerdy.

Yet Darby has since moved on from playing hapless managers, first appearing alongside such thespians as Philip Seymour Hoffman and Kenneth Branagh in Richard Curtis's The Boat that Rocked as a DJ – "
though my character was still very losery, even more of a loser, really;
he's thrown off the boat"
– and next year he will break the mould entirely as the lead in the romantic comedy Coming & Going, in which he plays "
a hunky doctor - HA!"
opposite Sasha Alexander, his Yes Man co-star. "
He's definitely not a nerd,"
insists Darby. "
But he is still zany."


Those movie roles play a large part in a short stand-up run Darby has just completed at the Bloomsbury Theatre in London and which he is now taking to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, in which he relates his journey from small-town Kiwi boy to Tinseltown leading man. "
For the most part, since I've become famous – it always sounds awful when you say that – it's an adjustment, and I wanted to laugh with people about those changes. Two years ago I was performing in tiny pubs in Wales, and suddenly I get this phone call from a Hollywood director saying that Jim Carrey wants to work with me. Jim Carrey!

"
After the first season of Conchords, I was really at a loss as to what to do, because I'd gone to America and thought, 'Here we go, I made the big move, I've given up the stand-up, it's going to be all acting from here,' and... nothing happened. The show hadn't gone on air yet, and there's no money doing stand-up in America unless you're a big name. Then Conchords was on HBO, word spread and it gained a big audience – including Peyton Reed [the director of Yes Man]. I was just lucky. What are the chances of your first big movie being with Jim Carrey? I'd idolised him."


Carrey himself likened the New Zealander to Peter Sellers – quite a claim. "
We had some fun improvising stuff,"
Darby explains. "
I improvised a lot more than he did – quite often because I couldn't remember the script. Half the time it's funnier than what they've written anyway. I'd look over to the writers and they'd put their thumbs up as if to say, 'That's awesome, we'll take credit for that!'"


It was less Peter Sellers than his erstwhile Pink Panther aide Cato that a frenzied Darby brought to mind in an advertisement he filmed last year with Roger Federer for Nike, playing a crazed fan who believed he was the Wimbledon champion's coach. The part, for which he leapt about the tennis star's living-room in a duel of thrumming forehands and sizzling smashes, took advantage of the physicality that has been a focal point of his comedy career. Whether it's his energetic impersonations of robots, jetpacks or dinosaurs, or bouncing around the stage to demonstrate the innate hellishness that is sitting in a stationary bumper car, Darby has been throwing himself around stages for more than a decade – and to ever-increasing crowds.

"
Before I left New Zealand, I was doing more gigs than anyone in Auckland – three a week. And half the time the audience would be the same people. At the one club, it would be 60 to 100 people a night, and the other two gigs would be 20 to 30. So when I first came to Edinburgh, in 2001, in a show called The New Zealand Brat Pack – we wore suits and drank Martinis – I was blown away. This amazing city, full of entertainers, 200,000 people. I fell in love with it and vowed to come back every year no matter what."


Which he did, for five years. Now, after two years away, Edinburgh is where Darby finds himself again. And chances are, this time one or two people (let's not get over-confident;
it's not the Kiwi way) might even recognise him before he starts gabbing away.

sargifster wrote:~ 7 minute video interview with Rhys at FHM.com

He talks Conchords as well as his own stuff.

Watch here:

I_am_Heather wrote:[url=http://www.fhm.com/reviews/tv/flight-of-....MgS2&WT.mc_ id=][/url]

"
Look mate, don't f*ck with my improvs!"

sargifster wrote:Ahh sorry.

How did I miss that? ??? ???

[size=100:wqzo0v1v]
Watching @rhysiedarby spying on gorillas in Africa. The look on his face when first spotting one=priceless. Love the gorilla impersonation 2

[size=100:wqzo0v1v]
watching 'Intrepid Journeys' with @rhysiedarby

[size=100:wqzo0v1v]
I'm about to watch @rhysiedarby try and speak gorilla in the jungle! Looks good.

[size=100:tuggtj8d]rhysiedarby.. look guys, I'm afraid I'm off to bed now so I won't be able to do that tweet till the morning. I know, I know.. Damn it!

Amily wrote:A tweet today which made me

[size=100:7k7gh577]rhysiedarby.. look guys, I'm afraid I'm off to bed now so I won't be able to do that tweet till the morning. I know, I know.. Damn it!

sargifster wrote:Video interview with Monkeymag



(go to page 3. Watch out for the boobs if you are at work...)

Rhys singing

Beyond real

fiddling with my nipples...

fanatical craziness of British and US Conchords fans.

(saying nothing about that last one for this UK fan. )

[flash=350,287:8e08wb74]https://www.youtube.com/v/OuBuAUrs3v0&hl=en&fs=1[/flash:8e08wb74]

[size=100:8e08wb74]Rhys Darby is letting his crazy at work for Loud Shirt Day, Friday 18 September 2009!

This is one day a year where everyone can go crazy and commit some serious fashion crimes by stepping out in their loudest, brightest shirts. Youll have a whole lot of fun and also be helping give deaf children a voice!

Register now at


Loud Shirt Day raises funds to help deaf and hearing impaired New Zealand children, for more information see

gezyka wrote:

sargifster wrote:Video interview with Monkeymag



(go to page 3. Watch out for the boobs if you are at work...)

Rhys singing

Beyond real

fiddling with my nipples...

fanatical craziness of British and US Conchords fans.

(saying nothing about that last one for this UK fan. )

It's on youtube now!

[flash=350,287:nttlejmn]https://www.youtube.com/v/48Ff5G_mZtA&hl=en&fs=1[/flash:nttlejmn]

OMG, RHYS. The singing and the hair = boobs parts:

I'm glad he realizes the fans aren't dangerous.

[size=100:4r2v3r4i]Two of New Zealand's most recognisable entertainers are giving the shirts off their backs for a good cause.

Or in the case of comedian Rhys Darby of Flight of the Conchords' fame - five shirts. And one of them could be yours.

But if Darby's style isn't what you fancy, there's the Cheryl West option: two shirts worn by Robyn Malcolm's character on the hit TV show Outrageous Fortune. Still not convinced? Then how about US rocker Alice Cooper's T-shirt?

It's all part of Loud Shirt Day, the annual appeal of The Hearing House and Southern Cochlear Implant Paediatric Programme. Each year up to 170 New Zealand children are born with a hearing problem, a figure expected to increase as newborn hearing screening programmes become established across the country.

For one week from Tuesday, the shirts, signed by Darby and Malcolm, will be auctioned on online auction site TradeMe.

And be warned, the shirts from Darby's wardrobe feature a wide variety of animals, outer space scenes and fish and the Cheryl West contributions contain see-through black lace.

In addition, there is a competition for which entrants must film themselves wearing a loud shirt. The winner, judged by Darby, will win a signed T-shirt featuring a roaring dinosaur.

Entrants should post shirt videos on YouTube and email loudshirtday@hearinghouse.co.nz with the link.

sargifster wrote:

[size=100:2y0uugdf]Two of New Zealand's most recognisable entertainers are giving the shirts off their backs for a good cause.

Or in the case of comedian Rhys Darby of Flight of the Conchords' fame - five shirts. And one of them could be yours.

But if Darby's style isn't what you fancy, there's the Cheryl West option: two shirts worn by Robyn Malcolm's character on the hit TV show Outrageous Fortune. Still not convinced? Then how about US rocker Alice Cooper's T-shirt?

It's all part of Loud Shirt Day, the annual appeal of The Hearing House and Southern Cochlear Implant Paediatric Programme. Each year up to 170 New Zealand children are born with a hearing problem, a figure expected to increase as newborn hearing screening programmes become established across the country.

For one week from Tuesday, the shirts, signed by Darby and Malcolm, will be auctioned on online auction site TradeMe.

And be warned, the shirts from Darby's wardrobe feature a wide variety of animals, outer space scenes and fish and the Cheryl West contributions contain see-through black lace.

In addition, there is a competition for which entrants must film themselves wearing a loud shirt. The winner, judged by Darby, will win a signed T-shirt featuring a roaring dinosaur.

Entrants should post shirt videos on YouTube and email loudshirtday@hearinghouse.co.nz with the link.

[url=Source][/url]

Haley - do you have a loud shirt? ;
)

sargifster wrote:

[size=100:sx542y77]Two of New Zealand's most recognisable entertainers are giving the shirts off their backs for a good cause.

Or in the case of comedian Rhys Darby of Flight of the Conchords' fame - five shirts. And one of them could be yours.

But if Darby's style isn't what you fancy, there's the Cheryl West option: two shirts worn by Robyn Malcolm's character on the hit TV show Outrageous Fortune. Still not convinced? Then how about US rocker Alice Cooper's T-shirt?

It's all part of Loud Shirt Day, the annual appeal of The Hearing House and Southern Cochlear Implant Paediatric Programme. Each year up to 170 New Zealand children are born with a hearing problem, a figure expected to increase as newborn hearing screening programmes become established across the country.

For one week from Tuesday, the shirts, signed by Darby and Malcolm, will be auctioned on online auction site TradeMe.

And be warned, the shirts from Darby's wardrobe feature a wide variety of animals, outer space scenes and fish and the Cheryl West contributions contain see-through black lace.

In addition, there is a competition for which entrants must film themselves wearing a loud shirt. The winner, judged by Darby, will win a signed T-shirt featuring a roaring dinosaur.

Entrants should post shirt videos on YouTube and email loudshirtday@hearinghouse.co.nz with the link.

[url=Source][/url]

Haley - do you have a loud shirt? ;
)

[size=100:ltxlm6c6]Rhys Darby - Space Oddity Brand new item

* Current bid: $51.00
* Reserve met Reserve met
* Closes: Tue 8 Sep, 8:30 pm
* Listing #: 239520256

Comedian Rhys Darby ventures into the solar system with this blue Loud Shirt, featuring stars, planets and black holes.

Signed by Darby - in black ink on a canvas strip specially sewn on the shirt - this is a unique shirt to wear on Loud Shirt Day, Friday September 18.Thanks to Rhys Darby for donating the shirt and for his pro bono appearance in the Loud Shirt Day TV ad.

All proceeds go to Loud Shirt Day on Friday September 18, which raises funds for the Hearing House and Southern Cochlear Implant Paediatric Programme - helping deaf children listen and speak. To find out more and register, visit

[size=100:ltxlm6c6]Rhys Darby - Animal House Brand new item

* Current bid: $51.00
* Reserve met Reserve met
* Closes: Tue 8 Sep, 8:30 pm
* Listing #: 239519551

Comedian Rhys Darby makes his own baboon noises in this gold, black and grey shirt. Seen in the Loud Shirt Day TV ad (as well as YouTube), it features baboons, rhinos, elephants, lions and tigers - so you can bring your own zoo into work.

Signed by Darby - in black ink on a canvas strip specially sewn on the shirt -this is a unique shirt to wear on Loud Shirt Day, Friday September 18. Thanks to Rhys Darby for donating the shirt and for his pro bono appearance in the ad.

gezyka wrote:

[size=100:lfxktthk]Rhys Darby - Space Oddity Brand new item

* Current bid: $51.00
* Reserve met Reserve met
* Closes: Tue 8 Sep, 8:30 pm
* Listing #: 239520256

Comedian Rhys Darby ventures into the solar system with this blue Loud Shirt, featuring stars, planets and black holes.

Signed by Darby - in black ink on a canvas strip specially sewn on the shirt - this is a unique shirt to wear on Loud Shirt Day, Friday September 18.Thanks to Rhys Darby for donating the shirt and for his pro bono appearance in the Loud Shirt Day TV ad.

All proceeds go to Loud Shirt Day on Friday September 18, which raises funds for the Hearing House and Southern Cochlear Implant Paediatric Programme - helping deaf children listen and speak. To find out more and register, visit

Source:

[size=100:lfxktthk]Rhys Darby - Animal House Brand new item

* Current bid: $51.00
* Reserve met Reserve met
* Closes: Tue 8 Sep, 8:30 pm
* Listing #: 239519551

Comedian Rhys Darby makes his own baboon noises in this gold, black and grey shirt. Seen in the Loud Shirt Day TV ad (as well as YouTube), it features baboons, rhinos, elephants, lions and tigers - so you can bring your own zoo into work.

Signed by Darby - in black ink on a canvas strip specially sewn on the shirt -this is a unique shirt to wear on Loud Shirt Day, Friday September 18. Thanks to Rhys Darby for donating the shirt and for his pro bono appearance in the ad.

Source:

[size=100:1rx8ktr9]Women's Huffer Tee 'I Rhys NZ'

$29.99



Two of New Zealand’s most iconic brands have joined forces in the name of the planet with limited-edition Huffer T-shirts to be available exclusively at The Warehouse.

[size=100:n0239wdx]I’ve been wanting to mention this.. every time I watch the NBC Nighty News their new corespondent [Chuck Todd] pops up. I’m not sure if its me, but he looks strikingly similar to Murray from Flight of the Conchords. I enjoy a laugh from serious news topics just by comparison. Congratulations Murray, you made it big!
[align=center:n0239wdx]


[/align:n0239wdx]

[size=100:i7bf66mz]It's Rhys Darby Night! Tour T-shirt



* Start price: $45.00
* No reserve No reserve
* Closes: Thu 3 Dec, 6:50 pm
* Listing #: 256517712

"
It's Rhys Darby Night"
tour t-shirt, available only at the shows and online!

T-shirt only comes in black, is high quality American Apparel and is available in the following sizes:

Mens S, M, L, XL and Women's S (size , M,(size 10) L (size 12), XL (size 14). Please note these are my approximations as Trademe does not have women's t-shirts in the S, M, L, XL sizing

Please see other auctions for alternative sizes