Janelle Koenig has been funny since – well – birth but her career in comedy started more than six years ago when she was discovered at the inaugural Jeez Louise Funny Women’s Forum.

Since this auspicious event she’s gone on to work with some of the best in the business - Richard Stubbs, Carl Barron, Dave Hughes, Jo Stanley, Rachel Berger and…err…Warwick Capper – to name drop a few.

She’s performed at the Adelaide Fringe Festival, the Melbourne International Comedy Festival, the Melbourne Fringe Festival, the first St Kilda Laugh Fest and the Brisbane Impro Fest. Laughing her way around the country from Marble Bar to Moe, Broad Meadows to Broom, Janelle flits seamlessly from the comedy stage to corporate gigs, from screen and radio to buck’s nights and football club bashes.  

Janelle has appeared regularly on Nova100’s Bang Up Wednesday and is the humour columnist for the international ‘Diane’ magazine. With multiple appearances on Foxtel’s Comedy Channel, Channel 31’s Champagne Comedy, Instant TV and Theatre Games Live, Janelle capped it off in February 2008, when she was hand-picked by NBC as one of only two Melbournian comedians to represent Australia in Last Comic Standing in Miami, Florida.  

Janelle is an accomplished comedian and a mediocre guitarist. Her unique blend of honest stand-up, cheeky songs and sometimes far too personal tales about all aspects of her own life have made her a favourite amongst Australian audiences. She’s proud to consider herself a ‘real woman’ but keeps her skinny jeans ‘just in case’.

She’s fun, fabulous, flirty and always a hit.

She might look innocent - and that's exactly how she gets away with it.

EDUCATION

Graduate Swinburne Univeristy Small Companies and Community Theatre - two year full-time course designed to prepare graduates for professional work as performers, writers, workshop leaders, project managers and technical support roles for small theatre companies, festivals, community theatre, theatre for schools, performance events and projects.

STAGE AND IMPRO

Richard Stubbs Comperes Le Joke – support act

Melbourne International Comedy Festival (2003)

The Crew -  Artistic Director, performer, tutor

Melbourne's longest-running improvisational comedy group.

Appearances include the Adelaide Fringe Festival (2004/2006), multiple  Melbourne International Comedy Festival and Melbourne Fringe Festivals.

Not Drowning, Dating - writer, producer, performer with comedian Jon Levene

Melbourne International Comedy Festival (2004)

The Brothers MacKenzie – writer, performer

Melbourne Fringe Festival (2004)

Life After Dick – performer, with Christine Basil, Bev Killick and Warwick Capper

Crown Showroom for the Melbourne International Comedy Festival (2005) and toured Western Australia.

Call Girls – writer, performer

Melbourne Fringe Festival (2005)

Melbourne International Comedy Festival (2006)

Show Us Your Roots  - performer, alongside comic veterans Rachel Berger and Carl Barron at the Canberra Theatre Centre (2006)

Hoodwinked - performer

Melbourne International Comedy Festival (2006)

Puppetry of the Penis – support act - at The Palms at Crown Casino, Melbourne International Comedy Festival (2007)

Instant Order - performer

Melbourne International Comedy Festival (2007)

Triple Trouble - performer

Melbourne International Comedy Festival (2007)

Musical Odyssey - performer

Melbourne International Comedy Festival (2007)

Brisbane Impro Fest – performer (2007)

St Kilda Laughs Festival Gala – performer 

Palais Theatre (2008)

RADIO

3MDR, Cubbyhouse weekly comedy radio show crew (2004/2005)

Nova100, Bang Up Wednesdays, regular guest (2007)

FILM AND TELEVISION

Instant TV, Channel 31 (2003 – 2004)

Champagne Comedy, Channel 31 (2004)

Comic’s Lounge, Promo DVD (2004)

Bunnings, Corporate training video (2005)

Crazy John’s, TVCs (2006)

Foxtel, Stand Up Australia (2006)

Foxtel, Stand Up Australia Day Live, live-to-air national telecast (2007)

Foxtel, Comedy Channel, interstitials and promo spots (2006)

Theatre Games Live, Channel 31, runner up (2007)

Siemens, Corporate training video (2007)

Love, Inc. Sitcom pilot (2007)

This Funny Week, Internet (2008)

Last Comic Standing, NBC (2008)

Angry Pinâta, Short Film (2008)

OTHER COOL STUFF ABOUT JANELLE

·         State Finalist in the 2003 Raw Comedy Competition.

·         National runner-up in both the You've Got To Be Joking (judge-voted) and Green Faces (audience-voted) comedy competitions.

·         Teaches a weekly impro class for aspiring comics at Melbourne’s Comic’s Lounge.

·         Janelle's episode of Stand Up Australia was voted by the public to be one of their top ten episodes, and as a result she was asked to perform on Stand Up Australia Day Live.

·         Janelle is published in Arts and the City, Get Lost! Magazine, The Groggy Squirrel and The Age.

·         She is the regular humourist columnist for the Curves magazine, Diane. http://www.curves.com/diane_mag

·         Her fabulous blog has been a myspace internationally featured blog! http://www.myspace.com/janellekoenig

·         She stage managed Matthew Hardy’s recent live DVD recording at the National Theatre for Sony/BMG (release Christmas 2007).

·         Janelle also supported Matthew on his ‘6 Shows, 6 States, 24 Hours’ show on Australia Day, 2008, raising money for the Make A Wish foundation.

·         Her website’s pretty awesome www.janellekoenig.com