Tripping Over Myself

A Memoir of a Life in Comedy

Plot

From Shaun Micallef, beloved host of ABC TV’s news satire Mad as Hell, comes Tripping Over Myself – an insightful and funny memoir about comedy and life that takes us through uncharted waters to unexpected places.

Comedy has been Shaun’s escape, his guiding light, his refuge, his passport, his lifebuoy, his drug, his mask, his means, his end, his lingua franca, his Self. But it’s not everything.

From his early years as a gangly, bespectacled nerd in suburban Adelaide to the giddy heights of national TV stardom, Shaun regales us with his experiences and his continuous reinvention through humour with… well, humour. He writes with candour about his successes and failures, loves and losses, along with tales of wine, women, song, and eccentric dancing. Behind the persona of one of Australia’s best-loved comedians lurks, as you will discover, an idiot.

Despite Shaun’s best efforts, Tripping Over Myself is sprinkled with thoughtful insights and observations and shows us how to persist in the face of adversity or even good fortune. You will laugh, you will dog-ear pages, you will wonder, you will Google ‘Jerry Lewis’, you may book a trip to India, and you will come away from this book reflecting on your own life in new and remarkable ways.

About the Author

After several years of practising law, Shaun Micallef threw it all away for a life in comedy and television. Since ’94 he has graced Aussie screens in shows such as Full Frontal, Sea Change, the short-loved but brilliant Micallef Tonight and the immensely popular Talkin’ ’Bout Your Generation – to name but a few. He has been nominated for a number of AFI, Logie, AACTA, Auggie and Director’s Guild awards and even won some of them. He enjoys wind farming and has written six books. Oh yes, and he also does a show called Shaun Micallef’s Mad as Hell.