{"id":523800,"date":"2026-03-07T03:01:15","date_gmt":"2026-03-07T03:01:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/523800\/"},"modified":"2026-03-07T03:01:15","modified_gmt":"2026-03-07T03:01:15","slug":"the-cranky-womens-club-using-comedy-to-tackle-serious-issues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/523800\/","title":{"rendered":"The ‘Cranky Women’s Club’ using comedy to tackle serious issues"},"content":{"rendered":"

The issues confronting women as they grow older are no joke, but that does not mean they are off limits for comedy.<\/p>\n

Janet Hogan, 65, recently took to the stage to share the funny side of her fading libido.<\/p>\n

“When you make yourself vulnerable and share something with the audience, and you hear the laughter, then shame goes away,” she said.<\/p>\n

“It is like, ‘Oh, good, a sacred cow has just exploded so let’s bring on the next one.’<\/p>\n

“I wanted to do something that scares me, and making people laugh on stage was it. The comedy spotlight is now a pursuit to the grave for me.”<\/p>\n

Loading…<\/p>\n

Ms Hogan is part of the Cranky Women’s Club \u2014 a course dreamed up by industry veteran Mandy Nolan.<\/p>\n

Ms Nolan said older women were not seeing themselves reflected in routines they heard at comedy clubs.<\/p>\n

“The comedy circuit is male-dominated,” the 58-year-old said.<\/p>\n

“But it is improving because more women and gender-diverse people have started coming into comedy.”<\/p>\n

Ms Nolan tailored the course specifically for perimenopausal, menopausal, or postmenopausal women.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

The audience gives the women, most of whom are first-time performers, a standing ovation. (Supplied: Lyn McCarthy)<\/p>\n

The show that followed featured many first-time performers and a sold-out crowd.<\/p>\n

During rehearsals, the 12 participants were encouraged to find the humour in some of their most confronting life experiences.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

The Cranky Women group learn comedy techniques. (ABC News: Donna Harper)<\/p>\n

“A woman, in tears, was standing in front of the others revealing her greatest heartbreak of when her female lover left her for an affair with a Buddhist monk,” Ms Nolan said.<\/p>\n

“Everyone in the room was empathetic, and then someone was brave enough to joke about how it sucked that she found the Buddhist monk’s underpants in her top bedside drawer.<\/p>\n

“She burst out laughing and said she had never seen it like that, and now the story that had haunted her was something she could enjoy being creative with.”<\/p>\n

Ms Nolan said the group worked on its jokes in a collaborative way that was also therapeutic.<\/p>\n

She said comedy was a “delivery system” for truth, allowing women to turn personal frustration or rage into resilience.<\/p>\n

One domestic violence survivor, Michelle Gardner, performed her stand-up routine as Shelley Stewart.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Michelle Gardner now wants to keep performing on stage. (Supplied: Lyn McCarthy)<\/p>\n

“I am a survivor of childhood domestic violence and that happened to Shelley, and Shelley lost her voice when she was very young, and I hope this comedy journey will help me find her voice again,” she said.<\/p>\n

“I have deep trauma from it, but I want to do comedy.<\/p>\n

“Women spend a long time not being heard, and they get to a certain age after years of people pleasing and pushing down resentment into a deep bucket, and when that bucket lid comes off, look out.”<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Michelle Gardner hopes comedy will give her inner child a voice. (ABC News: Donna Harper)<\/p>\n

Ms Gardner plans to continue her comedy journey with a performance at Broken Hill.<\/p>\n

Former brothel owner Joan Leeds signed up for the course for less dramatic reasons.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Joan Leeds says her experiences have given her rich material to use. (ABC News: Donna Harper)<\/p>\n

“I had just sold the Bangalow Post Office business and was bored out of my brain and thought, Why not do this gig?'” she said.<\/p>\n

Ms Leeds, a survivor of an abusive childhood, said she had great material to work with from her life experiences as a nurse and the former owner of Brisbane brothel The Viper Room.<\/p>\n

“I know some amazing women and have learned a lot about human nature,” she said.<\/p>\n

“The Cranky Women I met during the course had hard-luck stories but were as funny as hell.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Joan Leeds was bored after selling her post office business and wanted a new adventure. (Supplied: Lyn McCarthy)<\/p>\n

“Adversity can make you funny.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The issues confronting women as they grow older are no joke, but that does not mean they are…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":523801,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[64,63,9771,260872,260873,10934,39043,134,15434,25798,12632],"class_list":["post-523800","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-comedy","tag-cranky","tag-cranky-womens-club","tag-discrimination","tag-domestic-violence","tag-entertainment","tag-menopause","tag-rights","tag-women"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/523800","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=523800"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/523800\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/523801"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=523800"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=523800"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=523800"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}