Australian comedian Charles Firth is one tough cookie. When speaking to him, he spills like a good bottle of whisky, but try and research this sly rascal and you become the ‘chaser’. Firth is widely known as the co-founder of the television series The Chaser’s War on Everything, The Chaser satirical newspaper, The Chaser Decides, The Election Chaser, CNNNN: Chaser Non-stop News Network, and generally anything with the word ‘Chaser’ in front of it.

Firth is funny, smart, in-depth – and apparently has two wives. Even to this day I don’t know the truth of this claim, but what I do know is that his book, American Hoax, is a good read for anyone who’s tempted to bite into that sickly-sweet cookie, the American Dream.

First things first: a little interrogation. When I cross-examine him on the multiple-wife issue he’s offended, “It’s all true. It’s not satire; it’s just reality,” he says, crediting a mysterious woman he conversed with in an elevator en-route to the interview as part of his marital entourage¹. Needless to say, this unsettling encounter set the tone for the rest of the interview.

Apparently, The Chaser’s War on Everything was almost called ‘Not the Bert Newton Show’. However, The Chaser team, including Firth, unanimously detested the title. Firth had woken in a frenzied stupor, exclaiming “No! This can’t happen!” and decided, at the very last minute, to change the much-lauded ABC production to “The Chaser’s War on Everything”.

Stepping back from The Chaser, we explored Firth’s ‘hell-raiser’ roots. Firth, Chaser front-man Chas Licciardello, and writer Dominic Knight, were all high school chums at Sydney Grammer School. Moving in the same music and drama circles, they also worked on Tiger magazine which was, as Firth modestly places it, “The Bulletin of its day”.

The trio also ran a lunchtime television broadcast, SGS News, a primordial version of CNNNN. Questioned whether it provoked CNNNN-scale controversy, Firth said, surprisingly softly, “We did sort of thumb our nose at authority, but I think in the most … polite school boyish way, like, we thought we were scoundrels. But looking back… we didn’t manage to overthrow the school authorities or anything.”

Turning attention to his cracker of a book, American Hoax, the question had to be asked: “Why the USA?” Firth, adopting a snotty-American-teen voice, exclaimed, “Because they are the most powerful country in the world, and, like, training my satirical eyes upon them, you know, is like bringing down Rome. Or something like that…”

In writing American Hoax, Firth designed five characters that would actually infiltrate America in a way that he as an outsider could not. To do this, he created real CVs and back-stories on the internet for each alias, so that they could “seep seamlessly into the background noise of American commentary.” The book reads like a documentary, with Firth talking to the characters and assuming their identities as he emails various political powers, participates in marches, and travels to the Arizonan desert.

The only problem with an idea this great, Firth says, is that no one believes he that actually did this insane stuff.  During a period in which he was becoming comically frustrated, Firth comments, “It’s very hard to convince people … cause everyone goes ‘Oh you just made it up’, but I didn’t.”

On the actual process of keeping the imaginary aliases alive, he confided that it was incredibly hard to maintain, at times exhausting.  “Just grooming everyone who you’re starting to meet and everything like that, and once Edward McGuire really came to life – it was about humanity,” he says. “It was about emailing people back – not saying anything, but just being friends with people and stuff like that.”

It’s impressive how successful Firth is in convincing people that they’re conversing with a real person over the internet. Was he shocked? “Yeah, it was sort of scary and at the same time slightly reassuring. Like the idea that you could just be whoever you wanted to on the Internet, I think, is a fairly – it’s an empowering thing – especially for criminals…”

Enquiring as to whether being able to create a person cheapens human identity or uniqueness, Firth stood adamant that the ability to recreate one’s self, at least over the internet, is a positive thing. “I think either you create an unsuccessful avatar, or whatever, because you’re not being human enough, or you get into the character well enough that you’re actually injecting some of your own humanity in there and I don’t have a problem with it. I think that’s enormously creative”

Perhaps Firth isn’t the only one playing an identity hoax, perhaps even those in American politics create an avatar online. “There’s a real Wizard of Oz to that … like that conservative guy Neil that I met, [on the internet he] was actually quite a powerful man, but he was just this little man, who created this façade of power by creating a network of people, but,” in the end, “he was just this angry little bitter man – which I think actually was so symbolic of the conservative movement in America anyway: just little angry bitter men swinging their small dicks… largely.”

And to what end does this bring us? Firth suggests, “I think it … goes to the heart of how fraudulent” and “incredibly alienated” America, as a society, is. “People don’t know each other. In Australia I don’t think you can get away with it as much because, I suppose, it’s so small that everyone knows everybody else, whereas [in America] you do sort of rely on Wikipedia”.

If organisations like Wikipedia are necessary to human relationships, it is unsurprising that Firth comments on consumerism and ‘brand names’. Firth’s character Edward McGuire wants to rename the “War on Terror” to better market America’s wars to the rest of the world. On the suggestion that this initiative is insane, Firth reminded me that America had actually tried to rename the war The Long War. “America is so satirical in its actual realness … it’s very hard to keep outstripping America… because your satire comes true all the time,” says Firth.

Firth continues, “There’s no honest conversation on the left or right about why they’re in Iraq: it’s ‘support our troops’ or ‘bring them home’ or different things like that. It’s not about empire and securing resources for oil – no one’s talking about the actual, really problematic nature of both sides of … America in the war.”

Firth thinks that, “The left has this image that America is a peaceful nation that wants to stick to itself, but it’s completely untrue: it’s a war-mongering nation that bombs dozens of countries every year”. This whole idea leaves Firth in awe, “But it’s such a brilliant – I mean, what an amazing super structure, what an amazing time to be living to watch through such a grand act of self-delusion by an entire nation.”

Why does he see the country as so delusional? Firth seeks to explore this notion in his as yet-untitled documentary, which is, “On the surface about wanting to shake George Bush’s hand, but … actually, deep down, it’s looking at why Americans are so innumerate firstly … they just don’t understand numbers. And secondly, why they are so ignorant.”

Why is this? “It’s a systematic thing,” he says. “You go around America, most people don’t know how many people there are in America – they’ll say ‘five hundred billion’ or something, or that Mount Rushmore is in Queensland, because they don’t know better and it is a system of political control: if you keep the masses ignorant, the government can get away with anything. If you want a piece of evidence that America is, at heart, not a democracy, it’s how absolutely woeful the education system is in comparison to the rest of the Western world. There is just no comparison.”

It’s not surprising that the premise of the book is bringing down the ‘The American Dream’ and all that entails. “American Hoax is about my own hoax, but it’s also about the hoax that America’s leaders, and especially the conservative movement, had over the US in that post-9/11 environment.” This movement “[Creates] this huge ideological apparatus … in which everyone exists. Everyone, at some level, believes in ‘The American Dream,’” Firth suggests. But, “To even believe a little bit in the American Dream is to buy into something that’s utterly false at its core, cause American Dream is about freedom and liberty and yet America is itself the greatest war-mongering nation ever to exist.”

As the interview winds up, I can start to see the numbers flashing in my own mind: Charles Firth – 1, American Dream – 0. But before I let this wise, if not a little mad, sage go, I had to play a word associate game with him:

(World – bold, Charles’ response – not bold)

George Bush = “George H. W. Bush.”

War on Terror = “Uh… the… the… the greatest idea, in… Just a great idea is what it was. Just a great brand, great brand.”

CNN = “CNNNN.”

Charles Firth = “Greatest mind in the history of humanity. I’m quoting Wikipedia …”

Colin Firth = “Annoyingly attractive man… whom I’m often mistaken for.”

Emo bands = “Teen suicide. You know, being really funny. You know, like … the hilarity of teenage angst.”

Vibewire = “Vibewire. Greatest website ever … I was just quoting Wikipedia there as well.”

Firth’s book, American Hoax, is available to buy in various bookshops and comes highly recommended (by Firth himself). Also, keep your eyes at the ready for Firth’s US documentary, and his sidesplitting satirical video project Manic Times (www.manictimes.com.au). If none of these interest you then you have no funnybone or soul.

1        In the elevator with Charles prior to the interview, a mysterious woman turned to him and asked if he remembered her. He clearly didn’t. She then introduced herself as his first wife and from there they enjoyed a friendly banter. To this day I still don’t know if she actually was his primary spouse. (P.S. If Charles Firth himself ever reads this, he should be very pleased with the fact that I am using a footnote as, by my estimation, one quarter of his book “American Hoax” is written in the footnotes – but they’re all interesting very interesting.)