FEATURE

“I try not to be filthy these days”, says Rhys Nicholson, but he still loves a double-entrendre, setting out on a national tour called Seminal. Australia’s most glamorous comedian tells Andrew Creagh about his fiancé (“he’s a dick”), being bullied (“I was annoying”) and his legs (“if you can see them, we’re about to have sex.”)

Photography Christian Scott

Body make-up Sahra Bull (Instagram @sahrabull)

DNA: Let’s start with your gay wedding. In 2016, you “married” lesbian comedian Zoë Coombs Marr on stage to raise awareness of the marriage equality debate. Was the ceremony really disrupted by protesters?

Rhys Nicholson: It was absolutely staged. There were quite a few online douchebags about it [the wedding] but the people on stage where pretending to be bigots. It was Anne Edmonds and a few others.

Where were you when the Yes outcome was announced?

I was with my fiancé outside Melbourne Library.

What was your reaction to the result?

I’m not a crier but we started crying and kissed.

Were you confident that we’d get a Yes result?

Not really. You never know with this country. I’m sure there must’ve been some grim, neverpublished front pages of newspapers prepared in case it was a no. I’m writing a lot about this in my new show.

Will you marry your real partner, Kyran Wheatley?

Yes, probably next year.

Who proposed?

I proposed a couple of years ago, but I was drunk when I did it. We’d been to a friend’s wedding and it was lovely. I was quite drunk, he was completely sober and trying to go to sleep because he had to do breakfast radio the next day. I didn’t have a ring or anything – it was very much my style. But a few months ago, he proposed back to me, properly, on top of a hill in Edinburgh, with a ring that our friend, a jeweller, had made. Because he’s competitive. What a dick.