A comic couple finds space amid the hustle
Concetta Caristo and Ben Kochan go off-grid
There are lots of creative couples in the world. Like attracts like. But there are fewer that do exactly the same line of creative work, working both individually and together to advance their careers while also growing their relationship. Concetta Caristo and Ben Kochan are one of those couples. They're both comedians from wildly different backgrounds that now live together. They perform stand-up, appear on television and podcasts and radio and as Concetta puts it, are always hustling, coming up with the next killer joke or bit.
The reality of being a jobbing comic is less glamorous than the Netflix specials will have you believe. It's writing every day, trying to play every night, sometimes to full houses but often to half-empty rooms. It can take a lot out of you, especially, if like Ben and Concetta, you've spent the past two years trying to be funny almost exclusively on the Internet. The pair haven't taken a proper day off this entire year. Concetta, who was recently announced as a new host of triple j Breakfast, caught up with us to tell us what she got from getting unyoked.
So, I hear this was your first proper unwind of the year. Ben and I don't really go anywhere, so I thought it was such a fun thing to be able to do. It was awesome, it was so cute. What a gorgeous place and a gorgeous location...I just loved it. The bed next to the windows. I woke up on the last morning and I saw a frickin' wombat! Ben looked at it for one second and went back to sleep but I stared as it a lot longer.
Did you keep the curtains up? We were at Jojo, there were no curtains! Did you love that or hate it? I loved it. I am obsessed with windows; I love a bay window, a big window, outside meetings. To me, it was such an amazing moment to wake up with the sun. I try to do it at home and Ben is like 'f**k no', but then we came here and it was like 'Haha, I win!' I woke up with the light and stayed up. It was incredible.
You mentioned before that don't get to get away much? We're always doing comedy, we never have enough money to go anywhere and our savings are drained. We were going to go to Melbourne to do some gigs and we were looking at flights to come back and it was going up to $500. We would have lost money just to do gigs. It's also timing, especially with triple j coming up. My life is about to ramp up.
Can't spend all day in your pyjamas anymore... Haha! I'm going to try!
Would you say that even when you get away, you're essentially still working? That's so true! We got to travel this year because we were on tour but we literally discovered that if you go to a waterpark all day, you still have to work at night and be on and alert. You're exhausted. I always said to Ben that it's been a huge year and we should do something together that's not comedy. It's lovely but it's still work. This was our way of doing that.
A lot of comics have anxiety - surprise surprise - because your brain is just always ticking.
As a touring comedian, do you always have that anxiety of like 'I should be writing or doing more?' Yes, darling. I can't speak for everyone but being a creative being and technically a freelancer, someone who doesn't have a 9 to 5 check-in, check-out and whose brain is always working, you don't make those boundaries unless you force yourself to have them. A lot of comics have anxiety - surprise surprise - because your brain is just always ticking. Sometimes you just hit a wall and there's nothing you can do? That's when the best stuff happens.
What do you normally do when you hit a wall? Usually Ben is someone who says 'It's OK, go outside' or take a break or something like that. Stuff like this, just getting out, doing something physical. Releasing a little bit.
So how did you find being in the middle of nowhere with no expectations of what you were supposed to do? It was challenging! I think it was really daunting for Ben. It would have been different it we were alone. It felt like something that could be so useful if you needed to work on a big project or reset. But Ben, he's not that guy. He doesn't know how to chill. He always has to be doing something. He did relax eventually, but he was like 'what is this, what is being alone?' and I was like 'Mate, oh my god!' I love to do nothing. We're just very different.
You've been jumping from gig to gig for quite some time and now you're about to go full-time for the first time on triple j. How does that feel? Right now I'm in disbelief. It's just pure joy. I had been feeling this longing for work that went on for just a day or a night, I literally would feel it. I love people and relationships and feedback and building and coming to the same place. When you do TV you're in, you're out, fly-in and fly-out. Obviously you can freelance but you just book recurring roles that are small. This is just something else entirely. You try to get to a place like this but you never think it's going to come. I also have the anxiety of my life turning upside down, but I've been grinding at it and it's my dream.
You mentioned you love collaborating. But when you write standup, especially your own shows, is that something you have to take time out to do by yourself? I don't do as much writing with other people mostly out of sheer laziness. In terms of big shows, I haven't done a solo show yet. I worked on one myself, but I did show it to other people. I need outside perspectives to contemplate on and decide if I want to use it or not. I guess it's a bit of both.
I'm curious because I'm also a writer and even when you bring in other people, unless it's a writers' room, at some point you have to get stuck in yourself and try not to get distracted by shit. Yes, that's my whole life! Ben and I differ in this way, but he's so good at zoning in and doing things himself. I could be there but he doesn't get distracted, he stays focused. Very independent and solitary. The way I was brought up I was constantly with my parents or my family and I have this more shared brain. If I'm around people I don't know how to not interact. That's something we have to manage, Ben needs that time and I find it harder to fall into. We were talking about how it would be a useful thing for me to go to Unyoked alone next time.
What else did you do at Jojo? We did the bushwalk together. Then we went to do some painting - we do this thing in our show where we paint celebrities and I was like 'We should do that outside in nature!' - but then we forgot the paint (laughs.) So we sketched instead. We did a bit of writing. And then we watched Seinfeld that we'd downloaded onto our computer. But it was just like cooking and relaxing and staying chill. I'd recommend it to anyone.
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