Thirsty Read online

  I found Melissa, my new manager, after having been a fan of her achievements for a long time – and also by remembering that I had liked her dress at the Logies. (Fashion choices are always an important factor when making a life-changing decision – I told you I’m judgemental.) I was also incredibly intimidated by her, which I liked too. But I was perplexed as to how I was going to leave Andrew. I felt like a traitor and a monster, and had no idea how to convey that this decision had absolutely nothing to do with him personally or professionally – it was just something I had to do for me.

  In September 2016 I met with Andrew and his business partner, Jeff. The meeting lasted five minutes – I told them I was leaving, burst into tears and walked out. I felt as if I was breaking up with a boyfriend. I suddenly realised how hard it must’ve been for all the guys who have ever dumped me. Shit, being the dumpee is so much easier!

  And Andrew never said a word. I know he must have been infuriated, disappointed and very hurt. Like Sandra Bullock in her Oscar winning role, I had completely blindsided him. Yet I had to go with my gut. Even though my gut still churns every time I think of how that meeting went.

  I also swapped hairdressers that year. I could tell that story too but I feel like my editor is going to say no, so I’ll just leave it at that.

  Although 2016 was a rough year, it ended on a high, when I was awarded GQ Comedian of the Year. I’ve never won an award as a comedian. Ever. Nor do I particularly want to – I don’t think they’re necessary. It’s strange to think that awards can even be given to comedians, as comedy in itself is so subjective. But I must admit I was thrilled, and I really needed it, mentally. I took my dad to the awards ceremony, because he is my Man of the Year every year, and I felt so proud to show him off. Dad has never asked me to conform to the idea of your (or his!) ‘average’ man. He has never once winced when I’ve been camp, loud or brash. To be fair, he does often sport a pearl necklace on a black leather strip, so it may be a case of pot-kettle-black. He always brings all his mates along to my stand-up shows, where I regale the audience with some pretty hard-core stories about life and sex. Gay or straight, listening to your child’s sex stories must never be pleasant. Particularly given the sex stories I tell are normally about the times the sex isn’t pleasant.

  Dad was hilarious walking the GQ red carpet. He’d sussed out who the alcohol sponsor was on our way in and kept mentioning them – they must’ve been thrilled with the extra publicity. During the ceremony, Dad sat beside Angela Bishop, behind Iggy Azalea and in front of Ken Done. It was a more bizarre collection of individuals than the guys who went beyond the wall in Game of Thrones Season 7, Ep 5. It was a seriously fucking cool night that ended with an after-party in Matt Preston’s hotel room that lasted until 5 am.

  I ended 2016 by getting into bed at 10 pm on New Year’s Eve. I had decided I wanted to begin 2017 fresh and sans hangover and a stranger in my bed.

  It must’ve worked, because 2017 got off to a seriously great start when I received a pretty exciting phone call. It was February and I was standing in the kitchen of my mate Matt Gilbertson’s house. I was performing at the Adelaide Fringe Festival and preparing to launch my eighth stand-up tour, Poser, that very night. I was feeling the pressure, as I was now with new management and I wanted to give them a great show to tour.

  Melissa called, very excited, and asked if I would be interested in being the host of the Australian Eurovision broadcast, as the previous hosts were moving on. I immediately replied in the affirmative, of course! Asking a gay man if he wants to go to Eurovision? That’s like asking a vegan if they want to bring down the mood of a barbecue. The answer is going to be yes every time.

  Eurovision had always tickled me due to the sheer camp factor of it all. Country versus country in the biggest song competition in the world. Who can belt it out higher? Who can cram more key changes into one song? Who can stage the most ridiculous, hip-thrusting choreography? Which country can sport the most costume fabric that should avoid naked flame? I’ve been a huge fan of Eurovision for many years and have hosted Eurovision parties at gay bars around Melbourne. One of my dearest friends, Max, even works as a Conchita Wurst impersonator. To be fair – it’s not that challenging to dress in drag when you don’t even have to shave your beard off (sorry Max).

  So I signed on as host, alongside Myf Warhurst. I am a long-time fan of Myf’s, having grown up watching her on Spicks and Specks. And now that we’ve worked together, you’d be hard pressed to find a bigger fan than me . . . Except for maybe that one at the top of the flue in the fizzy lifting drink room in Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. That’s a pretty fucking huge fan.

  There was heavy speculation around who Australia’s new Eurovision hosts would be and we had a tough time keeping the secret, all the while knowing hundreds of other people in the industry were also after the jobs.

  In early April, Myf and I were unveiled as the Australian hosts of Eurovision 2017. The public reaction was really amazing and it was truly such an exciting day – I celebrated by drinking a bottle of French Champagne at the Adele concert, during which Adele pointed at me and told me I looked like a dancer. I’m not sure whether it was because I was genuinely dancing well or she was just being borderline homophobic but either way I loved it. I was quite surprised by the Eurovision reaction, to be perfectly honest. Not because of a lack of faith in what I could do, but because the previous hosts had been so incredibly popular, and they essentially introduced Eurovision to much of Australia.

  By May, Myf and I were both off to Kyiv (I know – I’m still as surprised by the spelling as I’m sure you are) in the Ukraine, along with an Australian delegation of about twenty people, including Australia’s Eurovision entrant, Isaiah Firebrace. It’s a good name for a pop star, don’t you think? Isaiah was seventeen years old and had just won X-Factor.

  The Ukraine wasn’t at the top of my list of places in the world to see – in fact I don’t think it was on the list at all. There are very few places in the world you can go where there’s a serious language barrier, but Kyiv is one of them. It took me a few days to adjust to the city – and ordering food. My first experience at a local café didn’t go too smoothly. I thought I was ordering a packet of chips and a can of Coke and I ended up with a cheese sandwich and a glass of milk.

  It was exciting walking around the city, though. It had been transformed for Eurovision as if the Olympics were in town. Essentially it was the gay Olympics. Eurovision flags hung from flag posts everywhere and there were posters in all the shop windows. Outdoor stages for live performances from contestants appeared in every major square. Just like the sound a vibrator makes, the city was abuzz.

  As the hosts for Australia, our main job was to provide live commentary from our very own ‘Aussie’ booth in the arena during the semi-finals and the grand final, just like football commentators (I assume that’s how it works for them, I really wouldn’t know). But our job also consisted of backstage interviews with artists from forty-three different countries, shooting footage around the streets of Kyiv and press commitments with Australian media back home. This was no quick Getaway segment – this was intense work.

  Tuesday evening was our first night in the commentary booth, broadcasting live to Australia. The show would begin in Kyiv each night at 10 pm, so the Western European countries would see it at around 8 pm and Australian audiences would get the show at 5 am on SBS, which many diehard fans wake up to watch. During this broadcast they would get to hear Myf and me but not see us. Then, for those not so eager for the early start, the Australian broadcast would be repeated at the more palatable time of 7.30 pm, with our commentary but also including all the pre-recorded packages we’d been filming.

  As Eurovision neared, the feedback online around Myf and me hosting began to turn outrageously aggressive for absolutely no reason . . . Myf and I hadn’t even gone to air yet! Suddenly people seemed to think we had ‘stolen the jobs’ of the previous hosts, which was simply not true. To further roc
k our confidence, an Australian reporter who was in town opened his interview with Myf and me by asking sensitively, ‘So Australia hates you – thoughts?’

  So it’s safe to say that, as we stepped into our commentary booth that first night, we were nervous – although we hadn’t admitted it to each other. However, we were also both extremely confident in what we could do, given our great chemistry: we’d fallen in love immediately during our screen test. We’d both done our homework and were extremely prepared, and we made a pact to each other to just relax and have a bit of fun, which was essentially our job: to be a fun, informed presence to guide Australia through the show. And I mean, come on, you can’t find a higher authority on music in Australia than Myf Warhurst, although Jenny Creasey would challenge that statement after a few wines.

  The first night, we arrived at the Eurovision Arena in Kyiv at around 6 pm. Security was insane and delegations required a police escort into the arena. I felt like Schapelle Corby arriving home in Brisbane. On top of that, metal checks and bomb checks and multiple levels of accreditation were required to get you backstage. The outside of the arena was lined with members of the Ukrainian army facing the road, each about three metres apart and holding a machine gun. Because nothing says ‘international unity’ like a weapon of mass murder. Due to the weather, they were in these long, wet-weather camouflage coats. They looked like Dementors guarding Hogwarts.

  Once you got there, however, backstage itself was quite relaxed. All the artists and delegations mingled together. In true Ukrainian style, there was one little café set up backstage with room-temperature beer and a couple of sad-looking sandwiches. I’m told previous host countries provided slightly more extensive catering, but Ukraine really just did the bare minimum. Myf and I loved sitting back there each day watching these artists who were now globally famous line up and pay for a packet of chips and a can of 7Up (although what they’d get was a cheese sandwich and a glass of milk).

  Myf and I had been backstage several times already as we’d been filming interviews with all the artists. There were some seriously brilliant and bizarre acts. My personal favourites were Slavko from Montenegro, who looked like Hugo Weaving crossed with a Game of Thrones Dothraki at Mardi Gras. He had a ponytail that went to the back of his knees, which he would whip around like a helicopter while singing his pop-dance number. Another act I loved was Jacques from Croatia – a larger man who sang an Andrea Bocelli/Celine Dion style duet . . . with himself. He wore a suit that was casual on one side and formal on the other. It was a bit of a trip.

  On the night of the first semi-final, while most of the delegation went with Isaiah to prep for his performance, a small group of us, including Myf and me, prepared for the commentary portion of the broadcast. At 9.15 pm we headed to our commentary booth. There was something like fifty booths located high up on either side of the stage overlooking the arena. Australia’s was between Denmark’s and Austria’s, whose commentators had been doing the job for years and looked Myf and me up and down with the kind of conceited ‘Hmm, we’ve not seen you before’ glare usually reserved for gay saunas and my mum’s Zumba class. Graham Norton, who commentates Eurovision for the UK, was in a commentary booth nearby too.

  When we arrived at our booth we were surprised to see technical crew there, along with a few Australian producers attempting to get a connection to Australia. Although we could speak to the technical crew in Australia through our headsets, for some reason they couldn’t get us to air.

  After about twenty minutes, panic started to set in thanks to the live broadcast rapidly approaching. People started to move faster and faster. Myf, with many years of radio and technical experience under her belt, sat in the booth and tried to communicate between the Australian and Ukrainian technical teams – she reminded me of a spy specialising in secret international liaisons. Given that she presses all the buttons for her radio show back in Australia, she also had some insight into the board in our booth. But she too was confused – pressing the button that would get our voices to go out live in Australia just wasn’t doing that. Nor were any of the buttons.

  I helped by pacing outside the booth and chewing anxiously at my nails. Every now and then I’d pop my head in and helpfully inquire ‘Anything? No? Okay,’ and then start on the nails on the other hand.

  At 9.55 pm there was still no solution – and we could see people starting to take places on the main stage of the arena, with the director talking to the audience, informing them the show was about to commence.

  At 9.58 pm, with no other option, Myf and I took our seats and just decided to see what would happen. Our notes that we’d spent weeks preparing had been knocked all over the floor as people had grabbed at cords and leads for the past half an hour. Crammed in behind us were several people still trying to fix the problem. As the countdown to showtime began on the stage, people in our booth started to raise their voices frantically, because we still didn’t have a solution.

  Seconds before we went to air in Australia, as Myf and I made one last ditch attempt by frantically prodding at buttons, Australia said they could hear us on the correct broadcast channel. But they could only hear us if we held down the mute button on our board in the commentary booth – and kept holding it down whenever we wanted to talk. Sorry . . . what?

  Completely perplexed and realising our whole booth had been patched wrong, we had no other option but to follow their instructions as the show was beginning and we were now live on Australian TV with our toughest critics, the diehard Eurovision fans who had been bashing us online for several days now, listening.

  Extremely stressed and panicked, Myf and I pressed the mute button and began to speak. The conversation we’d had about being ‘totally relaxed and just having fun’ was now completely wiped from our memories. We plastered smiles on our faces, looked at each other and I began: ‘Good morning, Australia, but good evening, Myf! Ladies and gentlemen welcome to Eurovision 2017 live from Ukrai–’

  Suddenly through our headphones Myf and I heard, ‘AUSTRALIA! THIS IS UKRAINIAN TECHNICAL SUPPORT! TURN YOUR BOOTH ON! TURN YOUR BOOTH ON! YOU ARE NOT TURNED ON!’

  Myf and I were simultaneously shocked, confused and angry . . . our booth was on! Hadn’t we just solved this problem? Hadn’t we had a cavalcade of people from Ukrainian technical support in and out of our booth over the last hour? As much as we’d love to have responded, ‘Our booth is fucking on!’, we were on air in Australia and thus were unable to say this (although our faces may have).

  The screaming continued down our headphones as we tried to push on.

  ‘I’m very excited, Myf, there are so many amazing acts performing toni–’

  Then another voice came on the line, the voice from technical support back in Australia who had told us to hold the mute button down.

  ‘Guys! Hold the button down! You’re not holding the button down. Why aren’t you holding the button down?’

  Myf and I continued talking while holding the button down as we’d been doing all along. I wanted to say ‘If I hold this button down any further I am going to push it straight through the fucking desk and into Sweden’s commentary booth below!’

  With two separate voices screaming into our headphones, Myf and I were taking turns mouthing, ‘What the fuck is happening?’ to the producers behind us.

  ‘All right, Myf, here is act one for Eurovision 2017 . . . It’s Lindita from Albania!’

  Finally the act for Albania walked on stage and Myf and I were fine to stop talking, turn the board off and talk off-mic. We threw our headphones off, swung around to our producers and said, ‘Oh my God, what the fuck is happening?’ We were both starting to shake.

  Technical support team members were running in and out of the booth, grabbing at leads. Myf and I were talking down the microphones to both Australia and Ukraine, trying to explain the problem. But all too soon Albania had finished and Myf and I were back on air.

  We began talking again.

  ‘Well, Myf, that was Albania. W
hat did you think of her perfor–’

  ‘AUSTRALIA TURN YOUR BOOTH ON! AUSTRALIA TURN YOUR BOOTH ON!’ we heard, followed by, ‘AUSTRALIA! PRESS THE BUTTON DOWN!’

  This kept happening for the next hour of the broadcast. We were commentating when we could, and simultaneously being yelled at. For the three minutes of each performance we would race around the booth pulling at leads and shouting. At one point I was pressed up against the wall, standing on one foot while someone grabbed at a lead under the desk, all the while pretending to have a conversation and hoping Myf was saying at least something similar. The last thing we had a chance to do was actually watch the acts, which made commentating on them a little tricky. But frankly that was the least of our worries. At one point, perplexed as to what to do, I just started shoving Ukainian brand cola bottle lollies in my mouth. I either needed the sugar hit or was trying to kill myself by asphyxiation – it was all a blur and I can’t remember.

  Apparently, the broadcast back in Australia kept dropping in and out – sometimes they were hearing us, other times they weren’t. Sometimes they were hearing Myf. Sometimes they were hearing me. They must’ve thought we were having conversations with ourselves. The crazy part was that the quickest way for us to find out if people could hear us was by tweeting, ‘Are we on air, Australia? Can you hear us?’

  Which of course meant opening the hellmouth of Twitter and seeing people say, ‘Wow, Joel and Myf are doing a shit job’, or ‘Oh, look Joel and Myf are off air . . . they were so shit SBS have fired them already.’

  At one point, to lighten the mood, I tweeted, ‘Gosh, this is so stresful in here, guys! I am desperate for a drink.’ I wrote it so fast I didn’t spell check and immediately someone replied ‘Umm . . . there’s two “S”s in “stressful”.’