Frank Woodley

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Frank Woodley (born February 29, 1968) is an Australian comedian who is notable for appearing alongside Colin Lane, forming the comedic duo, Lano and Woodley.

Frank is a musician, artist, comedian and acrobat. All four virtues appear in his works with guitar playing and singing in the album Sing Songs, drawings on Lano and Woodley's book Housemeeting, acrobatics in the TV production The Adventures of Lano and Woodley, as well as comedic talents in all of the above works.

The two also released the album, Lano & Woodley Sing Songs which included such humorous tracks as Toupee, Bouncy Rabbit and Head Over Heels.

They have since split to pursue solo careers.

Contents 1 Television appearances 1.1 The Found Objects 1.2 The Adventures of Lano and Woodley 1.3 The Island 1.4 The Goodbye Tour 1.5 Thank God You're Here 1.6 Australia's Brainiest Comedian 1.7 Metlink television advertisements 2 Stage appearances 2.1 The Complete Works of William Shakespeare Abridged 3 Solo shows 3.1 Possessed 4 References

[edit] Television appearances

Frank Woodley has appeared on several shows such as The Adventures of Lano and Woodley, Rove Live, Thank God You're Here, Spicks and Specks, Good News Week and Enough Rope with Andrew Denton. He also hosted a documentary about birds entitled "A Year On the Wing" and appeared in a series of Metlink television advertisements.

[edit] The Found Objects

In the mid-eighties Frank performed as part of a comedy trio named The Found Objects. Most of their work was stand-up comedy for various comedy festivals around Australia and then the world. They were picked up by ABC-TV's The Big Gig, which gave them the exposure that also boosted the careers of Paul McDermott and Tim Ferguson (Doug Anthony All Stars), Glynn Nicholas, Jean Kittson, Wendy Harmer, Jimeoin, Judith Lucy and acts like the Tapdogs and Umbilical Brothers.

In 1992, the third member of the group, Scott Casley, made a decision to move to Alice Springs. After valiantly attempting to keep the rehearsals going, the group acknowledged that the distance made life too difficult, and they parted ways. Frank and Colin renamed themselves Lano & Woodley and continued their comedy work as a duo.

[edit] The Adventures of Lano and Woodley

In their television series, on stage and variously where ever else they perform, Woodley acts to appear stupider than Lano (or "Col" as Woodley calls him for short) and is bullied and hit frequently by Lano with blunt instruments. In the episode "I Love You Baby" (part I), Lano explains to Woodley the definition of a non-existent word "painfullier" in this way:

Lano-"The first man hits the other man painfully-" (smacks Woodley in the face) "-the first man then hits the other man again...this time more painfullier." (smacks Woodley over the head with a frying pan).

[edit] The Island

In 2004 - 2005 Lano and Woodley performed a comedy show tour across Australia called The Island. The show comprised of comedy sketches, songs and interaction with the audience, all based around them being stranded on a desert island. A stand out feature of this performance was that there was only one major prop used: A motorized, revolving platform, which was used as a stairway, aeroplane, palm tree and court room stand.

[edit] The Goodbye Tour

After 20 years together, Frank Woodley and Colin Lane decided to split up and ended with a show that travelled around Australia.^[1] The show was full of classic and new jokes, songs and sketches. The DVD that came out showing the Goodbye Tour was of the last Melbourne show.

[edit] Thank God You're Here

More recently, Frank Woodley has regularly appeared on Thank God You're Here, a comedy improvisation show where the improviser walks through a door into an unknown world. Woodley seems at ease with the daunting flow of the program, and often intimidates the prepared actors themselves by taking control of the scene. Frank has appeared on Thank God You're Here six times to date.[1]

[edit] Australia's Brainiest Comedian

Recently in 2006, Frank Woodley appeared on "Australia's Brainiest Comedian", a quiz show hosted by Sandra Sully. Woodley was defeated by fellow comedian Peter Helliar.

[edit] Metlink television advertisements

In 2008, Frank Woodley appeared in a series of quirky, humorous television ads for Metlink promoting public transport in Melbourne, in particular buses. Woodley is seen playing guitar and singing a humorous, catchy jingle entitled "I highly recommend you get on the bus".

[edit] Stage appearances

[edit] The Complete Works of William Shakespeare Abridged

In April 2007, Frank Woodley and two other Australian actors, Keith Adams and Damian Callinan, performed a stage show called The Complete Works of William Shakespeare Abridged which was 37 Shakespearian plays done in 97 minutes. The show was only performed in Brisbane and Perth. The shows ran from April 18th to June 10th 2007.

[edit] Solo shows

[edit] Possessed

Possessed is Woodley's first national solo show^[2] debuting at the 2008 Adelaide Fringe Festival.

[edit] References