Entertainment
11 March, 2023
For the love of laughter
A MAREEBA comedian with a passion for putting smiles on other people’s faces has made it through to the semi-finals of the Raw Comedy Competition with hopes to make it to Australia’s most prestigious comedy stage later in the year.
Stand-up comedian Ty Thomas got his start in comedy in Cairns on a whim, after deciding to reward himself for completing his certificate of nursing and attend an Iron Mic comedy night.
His love for making people laugh begun much earlier, when the 26-year-old was 12 during a family visit to Brisbane.
“I watched about four different Arj Barker specials and fell in love with the idea of making people laugh,” he said.
“I love the sound of people laughing and it is nice to be the reason they laugh.
“Comedy made me feel a lot better a lot of times when I was feeling down, so to know that you can do that for other people is pretty special.”
Ty said laughter truly is the best medicine and it helped him through a lot of tough times in his life, so he feels incredibly honoured to be able to give that experience to other people.
Ty has even had the chance to open for popular Australian comedians such as Luke Kidgell and Paul McDermott.
His love of laughter is what drove Ty to move suddenly from the Far North and relocate to the south east capital, Brisbane, with a much fiercer comedy circle.
Just prior to moving he saw the Raw competition and decided to sign up in Brisbane and has now made it through to the first semi-final due to take place on 19 March.
Raw Comedy is a competition put on by the Melbourne International Comedy Festival and gathers Australia’s best up and coming comedians.
They all compete in regional heats until the state finals where the winners of the state heats are then chosen to perform at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival from 29 March to 23 April.
