Jordan Raskopoulos

Jordan Raskopoulos (born 25 January 1982 in Sydney, Australia) is an Australian comedian, actor and singer best known for his role as a writer and performer on the Network Ten sketch comedy show The Ronnie Johns Half Hour,^[1] and as lead singer for award-winning comedy rock group The Axis of Awesome.

Career

In 2003 Raskopoulos became involved with Impro Australia's Theatresports events including The Belvoir St Theatre Theatresports and the Cranston Cup competitions, winning State and National Titles.^[2] In 2005 he became part of the university sketch comedy supergroup The 3rd Degree who performed at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival. This group formed the base of the Network Ten’s Logie- Award winning cult ensemble sketch comedy television show The Ronnie Johns Half Hour, which Raskopoulos starred in and wrote for.^[1]

After the success of The Ronnie Johns Half Hour Raskopoulos went on to appear in Stupid, Stupid Man, Stand Up Australia, Hole in the Wall, Good News Week and Thank God You're Here, and has provided voices for the ABC2 machinima series The Team. He was a team captain for a season of the SBS sports show The Squiz.^[3] In 2007 his debut solo stage show was called The Adventures of the Man with the Dominant Claw.^[4] With his band The Axis of Awesome, Raskopoulos has appeared regularly on Q&A, Good News Week and The Footy Show.

Since 2006 Raskopoulos has fronted the award-winning musical comedy trio The Axis of Awesome, whose parody song "4 Chords" has received almost 50 million hits on YouTube and is one of the highest rated comedy videos on the site. The group came to attention after the release of their songs parodying the 2007 Australian federal election and received a Moosehead award at the 2008 Melbourne International Comedy Festival for their show "The Axis of Awesome Comeback Spectacular".^[5] Since 2009 the Axis of Awesome has produced four albums and toured extensively in the USA, UK, Europe, Asia and Australia, with sold out seasons at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.

Logies Controversy

Raskopoulos was cast in the supporting role of Trax in the 2012 movie Underground: The Julian Assange Story^[6] along with Rachel Griffiths, Anthony LaPaglia and Alex Williams. In January 2013 Raskopoulos requested users of the internet forum Something Awful to vote for him in the most popular actor category of the 2013 Logie Awards, promising in return to allow site users to write his acceptance speech. This caused some controversy, with news outlets reporting that Raskopoulos, who despite a high-profile international comedy career was a relative unknown in Australian acting circles, planned to 'hack' the Logies.^[7][8] Raskopoulos himself described his campaign as no different to any ordinary "fan" campaign, stating "I'm conspiring to rig the Logies in the same way Guy Sebastian's fan forums are, or [in the same way as] fans of The Voice are calling for votes for Joel Madden on Twitter.".^[9] In support of his campaign to win votes, Raskopoulos appeared in a segment on Australian current affairs program Today Tonight dressed in a fur collar and acting in character, and stated that he wished to win a Logie for use as a doorstop.^[10]

References

External links

• jordanrasko.com
• The Axis of Awesome
• Jordan Raskopoulos at the Internet Movie Database
• Jordan Raskopoulos on "The Ronnie Johns Good Times Campfire Jamboree Half Hour Show".