Sam Simmons (born 1977 or 1978) is an Australian comedian, actor, and radio and TV presenter. He has toured extensively with his stand-up shows, as well as many appearances on TV in Australia, the US, and the UK. He has won and been nominated for many awards, and won the Helpmann Award for Best Comedy Performer in 2014.
He was raised in Adelaide by a single working mother, and has hinted in his shows that he was somewhat neglected as a child. His best friend described his childhood as "troubled". Going through a tough time as a 13-year-old, he attempted suicide.[4]
Simmons' first performed comedy in 2001, at a benefit show for a friend whose handbag had been stolen. Performing as a duo with another young man, they presented Smutty and Pert, like Ernie and Bert (from Sesame Street. Later, working at Greasy Joe's in St Kilda, he would perform for the patrons of the café, who were a diverse audience.[4]
He then began to perform in comedy rooms, "just doing my own thing", which was not stand-up, according to Simmons. Janet McLeod gave him a contract to perform for two months at her Local Laughs night.
He performed at TEDxSydney in 2014.[6] In the same year, he developed and performed his show Death of a Sails-Man, which one reviewer described as "an extremely quirky one-man monologue... a man live on stage having a breakdown, singing, reflecting and joking with his sub-conscious".[7]
His 2015 award-winning show, Spaghetti for Breakfast featured his usual "silly" (self-described) pieces, followed by a deeply personal reference to how he nearly committed suicide as a young adolescent.[4]
When in Los Angeles, he did regular shows with Dr Brown (Phil Burgers), and they worked together on developing a TV series.[4] In 2015, they performed together at the Soho Theatre in London, in a show called Ceremony, which Burgers described as "two idiots playing with the idea of ceremony".[8]
In March 2016, Simmons performed a new show, Not a People Person, at MICF.[4]
After living for some time across three cities (Sydney, Los Angeles, and London, he announced early in 2019 that he was going to quit touring with live comedy for a while after his current commitments with his new show, 26 Things You're Doing Wrong with Sam Simmons, although still intending to do some acting and write TV scripts.[9] At several comedy festivals in 2019, Simmons performed a new show, 26 Things You're Doing Wrong with Sam Simmons about unconventional life hacks.[10] In December 2019, he performed for 10 nights at the Soho Theatre in London,[11][12] and in 2020 was working on a solo show called FUNT there.[5]
In 2021, he performed a show in the Spiegeltent at the Adelaide Fringe entitled Sam Simmons is Putting Things on His Knee to Raise Awareness for People Who Not have Good Knees, based on fictional stories about celebrities.[13] In 2022, he performed Be a Verb at the Garden of Unearthly Delights in the Adelaide Fringe.[1]
In March 2024, Simmons performed his new show Man With A Fork In A World Full Of Soup at the Adelaide Fringe, which earned good reviews.[14][3]
John Bailey wrote in The Sydney Morning Herald in 2016: "...an hour with Simmons is a tour of the comic spectrum: physical comedy, musical comedy, sketch and character work, puns, one-liners, shaggy dog stories, mime, crowd work, visual gags, observational comedy, meta-comedy and more, all delivered with the kind of pummelling intensity...".[4]
TV and radio
Simmons has also made regular appearances on TV since 2003, as a stand-up comedian, as a guest, in comedy sketch shows, and as an actor (including a main role in the comedy series Squinters).[5] Network appearances include NBC, BBC, Channel 4, Comedy Central, ABC, and other Australian networks.[5][12]
He appeared on Conan in the US in 2013, after moving to Los Angeles in June of that year. Host Conan O'Brien called him "a very strange fellow". Simmons said that the US show allowed him greater freedom in presenting his "weird" stuff.[2] He has also appeared on another American TV show, Adam Devine's House Party, as well as the British shows 8 Out of 10 Cats, Room 101.[12][5][1]
On radio, Simmons started as a regular guest on the morning show The Pinch on Triple R (Melbourne) in 2003.[5] He became a regular host on Triple J radio station[2] from 2005.[5]
In 2012, Simmons followed up with a sketch-style TV series Problems, with a tone more similar to that of his surrealist stand-up shows. After moving from Adelaide to Los Angeles, in 2013 he filmed a US pilot in Albuquerque with David Quirk, described by Simmons as "a reality show about animals".[15]
In 2017, he provided the voice of Mr Wallaby in Peppa Pig.[5][12]
Since 2022 and as of March 2024[update], Simmons has hosted the podcast Niche as Quiche,[17] a regular deep-dive into various niche subjects and stream-of-consciousness topics.
Note: The Barry Award and Edinburgh Comedy Award are regarded as the two top comedy prizes, and at this point Simmons was one of only two people ever to have won both for the same show, the other being American comedian Phil Burgers ("Dr Brown").[4]
Nominations
2003: National finalist, Triple J Raw Comedy Competition[5]
2014: Edinburgh Best Comedy Award[5] for Death of a Sails-man
Personal life
Simmons married Roslyn Durnford.[4] In February 2019, Simmons revealed that he was father to a baby, and wanted to spend some time enjoying family life.[9]
He said that he loves LA, with its "weird hippie thing" where he attends yoga classes and does not drink alcohol, whereas in other places he would drink too much.[4]
He loves animals, and has considered a career in animal husbandry or zookeeping. He said that he would love to make animal documentaries, like David Attenborough. His oldest friend, Stuart Peevor, described him as a "generous" and "warm" person.[4]
^"Comedy". Comedy.com.au. Archived from the original on 20 November 2008. Retrieved 24 February 2009.
^"The Groggy Squirrel". Archived from the original on 6 January 2009. Retrieved 24 February 2009.
(The Groggy Squirrel Critics' Award is open to Australian acts only.)
^ abcd"Awards". Melbourne International Comedy Festival. Archived from the original on 11 January 2016. Retrieved 19 July 2015. The Directors' Choice is awarded by the Comedy Festival Director, in consultation with other visiting Festival Directors, to a fabulous show that somehow missed out on any other prize.
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