Jeez Louise: Memoir

Louise Swinn is a journalist, editor, critic and writer, co-founder of Sleepers independent publishers, the Small Press Network, and the Stella Prize. Louise edited Choice Words (Allen & Unwin, 2019), a collection of pieces demystifying abortion, and currently works as a journalist with the Australian Education Union.

Journalist, writer, comedian, producer, publicist; in one way or another Joanne Brookfield has spent her entire career moving within the world of comedy, so it makes complete sense that her first book should be about women in comedy.

Joanne interviewed 60 women for No Apologies: Women in Comedy Claiming their Space, Finding their Voice and Telling their Stories, which is now available in bookstores across Australia.

Cassie Workman is probably the most experienced newcomer to comedy in the country, owing to the fact that she previously performed under another name. She has recently returned to the stage after beginning her transition, and is already making waves.

Cassie Workman is known for her heartfelt and emotive storytelling, her incisive wit, and brutal deconstructions of the status quo. There is no other voice like hers in comedy today.

 

Cassie entered the public eye after winning Triple J’s Raw Comedy national open mic competition in 2009. She then debuted in Edinburgh, and the following year was invited to perform in the Melbourne Comedy Festival’s Comedy Zone showcase for emerging talents.

She performed her first full length show in the Melbourne International Comedy Festival in 2011. The show, Humans are Beautiful, won Best Newcomer that year, and toured the country, before heading to Edinburgh Fringe.

In 2012, she performed her second full-length show, Mercy – a multimedia performance about a Cuban dissident – to sell-out crowds. The show toured the country and the UK, and won Best Comedy in the Adelaide Fringe. It was later recorded and televised on the ABC and distributed through Madman Entertainment.

In 2013, Cassie toured the much-acclaimed full-length show, Ave Loretta, solidifying her position as one of Australia’s leading storytellers/stand-ups, and earning her a nomination for best show (The Barry Award) at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival. The show also won Director’s Choice at the Sydney Comedy Festival.

Cassie wrote and performed another full-length show in 2014, called “War” which toured the country and was invited to be reprised in Melbourne for theatre.

In 2015 Cassie performed the full length show We Have Fun Don’t We to great popular acclaim, making it her most successful performance to date.

After a festival hiatus in 2016, Cassie returned to the circuit in 2017, this time with a stand up show, Nothing You Do Means Anything. The show quickly achieved cult status as a subversive hit, and toured the country.

Cassie has appeared in It’s a Date and Die on Your Feet for the Ten network. She has written for Tractor Monkeys (ABC) and publications as diverse as Blitz Martial Arts Magazine, Tiger Airways’ inflight magazine Tigertails, the West Australian and The Music.

Since the beginning of 2017, Cassie has focussed on writing – as a freelancer on John Conway Tonight (ABC2) and as head writer on the cult favourite Aaron Chen Tonight (ABC2).

Also in 2017, she came out as transgender, and began transitioning. After a brief absence from the stage, she is now back and kicking ass. She contributed to ABC1's Tonightly with Tom Ballard with her series ‘So You Think You Can Trans’, which has been picking up thousands of views and shares online.

Her 2018 show Giantess was debuted at Griffin Theatre’s Batch Festival in Sydney. Giantess interweaves music, comedy, storytelling and illustration, while exploring the anguish of coming to terms with a gender identity that doesn’t match your body.

In late 2018, she joined the writing team on ABC1’s Shaun Micallef’s Mad As Hell.

Em Rusciano is one of the most talented and in demand entertainers in Australia. Em is a comedian, singer, writer, storyteller and broadcaster. She hosts the Emsolation podcast which was Australia's first Spotify exclusive show. Em is also a regular panellist on Network Ten’s The Project. Em’s social media community is fierce, loud and passionately loyal. With a Facebook following of 279,000 fans, 35,000 on Twitter and 227,000 on Instagram, she has a weekly social media reach of up to 10 million. Em has two dogs, three kids and one husband. Is that the order in which she loves her family? Sometimes, yes. Em regularly encourages her family members to keep trying, to improve their spot in the order. Most importantly, she still finds time to watch every single episode of Ru Paul’s Drag Race. Priorities are essential.