#278: Chris Parker - Creating Together

Chris Parker is an award winning comedian, actor, writer,
show-runner and podcaster. 


This past year Chris hosted the New Zealand Comedy Festival Gala,
and toured his latest show, Give Me One Good Reason Why I
Shouldn’t Throw My Phone Off This Bridge, to full houses
throughout Australia and New Zealand. He also made his prime-time
Australian TV debut on Thank God You’re Here (where he
won the episode) and released the highly anticipated second
season of Double Parked. Chris Parker is most commonly known
for his funny Instagram and TikTok videos which built him a huge
social media audience over the last few years. His legendary win
on the hit New Zealand TV show Celebrity Treasure Island made
history!


His 2018 New Zealand International Comedy Festival show Camp
Binch, was awarded the prestigious Fred Award for Best Show in
the Festival and went on to play to 5-star reviews and sell-out
crowds at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Fun fact, the felt hat
he made during the 2020 nationwide lockdown was acquired by and
is on display at The Auckland Museum and Te Papa the National
Museum of New Zealand. Kinda dramatic – don’t you agree? Chris is
a theatre graduate from the renowned drama school Toi Whakaari O
Aotearoa and he has appeared in and written multiple theatre
shows across New Zealand, most notably Hudson and Halls Live!
Where Chris played one-half of the famous gay cooking duo, David
Halls and won best actor at the 2017 Wellington Theatre Awards.


Chris has appeared in feature films such as Baby Done, The
Breaker Upperers and Nude Tuesday and has two feature films of
his own currently in development. As a comedian and writer Chris
is a regular face on New Zealand television appearing on 7 Days,
Have You Been Paying Attention NZ, Jono and Ben, Funny Girls,
Season 3 of Taskmaster New Zealand and the sitcom Golden Boy.
Chris also co-hosts the podcast The Male Gays with fellow
comedian Eli Matthewson, which has an upcoming digital video
series in production. Chris was listed as The Herald’s top 5
Entertainment Heroes of 2020 and in 2021, was nominated for
Television Personality of the Year. In 2022, Chris was the
recipient of the inaugural Topp Prize awarded by the New Zealand
Comedy Trust for Aotearoa’s most generous and gifted comedian.
That same year released the comedy/documentary special Chris
Parker: Back To School, about all boy schools in Christchurch.
Chris embarked on an Australian and New Zealand national tour of
his show Gentle Man to sold-out crowds and 5-star reviews and his
debut novel Here for a Good Time was released through Allen &
Unwin.


In 2023, Chris toured his new show, Lots of Love, Chris Parker,
to sold-out audiences in Australia and New Zealand. Chris’s new
comedy series, Double Parked, premiered in June and was created
and written with Alice Snedden.

He was the show runner and writer for the narrative comedy series
Double Parked and is currently touring his live stand up
(Stop Being So Dramatic) shows across New
Zealand and Australia.


Stop Being So Dramatic are four words the
self-proclaimed People’s Princess of Aotearoa Chris Parker has
heard his whole life. Now those words also happen to be the name
of his show touring Australia and New Zealand in 2025. At the
culturally relevant age of 34, Chris is ready to address the
drama queen allegations head-on. Stop Being So Dramatic promises
to be an hour of high-intensity, feverishly paced and dizzyingly
expressive comedy, it’s a one-man variety spectacle, chill,
stand-up hour of laughs. That doesn’t sound dramatic at all –
does it? Chris admits, there is some merit to the accusations,
such as crying in every speech he’s ever delivered publicly, and
there may have been a situation this year where he slept on his
neck weirdly resulting in a neck brace. Still, Chris is sure he’s
just a chilled guy, down to Earth and he’s ready to prove it to
you in Stop Being So Dramatic.


 


We chat about his evolving voice, performing on a broken foot
(multiple times), being an improv king and his 10 hour improv
day, being the felting guy, his upcoming tour, being a show
runner and leadership, thriving on celebrity treasure island plus
plenty more!



Check Chris out on:


Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chrisparker11

Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@chrisparkernz

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/itschrisparker


Website: https://www.chrisparkercomedy.com

Melbourne comedy
tickets: https://www.comedyfestival.com.au/browse-shows/stop-being-so-dramatic/



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