Richie Faavesi is the manager at Grace Foundation Whanganui. Photo / Mike Tweed
Richie Faavesi will soon be on stage at the Royal Whanganui Opera House, a dream come true and a far cry from where he comes from.
The comedian, in his third year of performing, said laughter had always been his “go-to”.
“Humour has been there my whole life and as a way of dealing with things that were too depressing to sit with,” Faavesi said.
“I was always the class clown, the funny guy, even through my gang life.”
Faavesi is the manager of Grace Foundation Whanganui, a rehabilitation and accommodation service for people released from prison.
He said Raw Comedy Quest central North Island organiser Ben Caldwell had been instrumental in his comedy career.
The Raw Comedy Quest is a series of stand-up competitions, with regional heats, semifinals and a grand final in Auckland
Two days after a call from Caldwell, Faavesi found himself on stage for the first time – “things got real serious, real fast”.
“Ben was the first one who believed in me, even down to setting up the speakers and stuff like that.
“Big shout-out to him.”
Faavesi is part of Chocolate Humour, a comedy collective featuring Kajun Brooking, Luke Tawi, Opeti Vaka and Shady Tupu.
He and Vaka will perform together at the NZ International Comedy Festival this year.
Brooking will be there with his show Kajun Brooking Escapes The Hood.
Caldwell, a redhead, had asked to be part of the group under the alias Orange Roughy, Faavesi said.
“We were like, ‘Yeah, we’ll think about it, aye Ben’.
“‘Maybe you can be like Jerry Heller, the white manager of NWA’.”
Caldwell said Faavesi was a perfect example of how comedy could be a force for good.
“There tends to be a lot of middle-class comedians coming through at the moment because that’s where it’s easily accessible – you can afford to take the risk,” he said.
“Richie provides a very unique voice on the scene.
“The first gig he did was one of the best first-time performances I’ve ever seen.”
Some in the comedy industry, particularly those in larger centres, had been sceptical about Chocolate Humour’s material and branded it “borderline inappropriate”, Faavesi said.
He embraced the tag: “I’m wearing it.
“It’s ‘hood humour, it’s garage humour, it’s street humour.
“We used to think it was a brown thing, but we’ve found there’s so many New Zealanders who went to school with or were brought up in the same neighbourhood as Māori and Pacific Islanders.
“They have a fair idea about what we are talking about.”
Faavesi said for him, comedy was about giving something to people.
“I did a lot of stupid things in my past and it got to a point where I thought, ‘This is not me. What have I come to’?
“You can get caught in a downward spiral and the heaviness of things.
“Now, I can joke about it, laugh about it and carry on.”
In June, he will perform at the Hello Comedy Gala at the Royal Whanganui Opera House, alongside Josh Thomson, Ben Hurley, Brooking and more.
“That is huge for me. I’ve always sat in the crowd and been blown away,” Faavesi said.
“To be part of that line-up, I have to pat myself on the back and say ‘F***, you’ve done it’.
“If I didn’t, people in Auckland would wonder why I’m up there trying to do shows when I couldn’t even get one in my hometown.”
Caldwell said Faavesi was “a natural” with a lot of life experience to pull from, even if some of it was dark.
“Richie has worked hard and deserves every success that comes his way.
“He’s showing that comedy can be an outlet for people who might not think it’s possible.”
He said he “didn’t really want to be Orange Roughy anyway”.
“A mix of orange and white chocolate doesn’t sound very nice.”
Mike Tweed is a multimedia journalist at the Whanganui Chronicle. Since starting in March 2020, he has dabbled in everything from sport to music. At present his focus is local government, primarily the Whanganui District Council.