Brynley Stent, 30, is in the cast of Three’s local comedy Dai’s House Party. She was born and raised in Christchurch and attended drama school in Wellington. Acting credits include Funny Girls, Jono And Ben and Shortland Street where she played the sister of Damo (Grant Lobban). Stent lives in Auckland and her flatmates include her actor partner Adam Brown and comedian Chris Parker.
Did you pick up any new hobbies or habits in lockdown?
Chris (Parker) and I have started walking. We never walked before really. Every morning we get up at seven and we go for a walk around the block. We’re very much acting like an old married couple or a retired couple. And I’m an avid meal prepper. I normally do meal prepping on a Thursday and let that go through the week. On the first or second day of the lockdown I cooked about three families’ worth of meals. The next day I went, ‘Oh gosh. I’ve got nothing to do’.
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What did you want to be when you grew up?
When I was very young I wanted to be an icecream salesperson and then all through pretty much intermediate and high school, it was animals. I wanted to work for DOC or the zoo – something like that.
An icecream salesperson?
My parents are quite health conscious and so we weren’t really allowed a lot of sweets or much sugar. We ate very, very well, a lot of homemade stuff, and so because of that I was a full-on sugar fiend. I would do things like steal lollies and stuff from the dairy. Really bad behaviour. I had this like sort of sugar addiction and I just wanted to get my hands on it whenever I could. I guess the idea of being an icecream salesperson was just like, ‘Well, I would be able to eat icecream at any point of the day whenever I like’.
Did you grow up in a house where there was lots of laughter?
Yeah. My parents were not performers. They were both hairdressers. They owned a salon together in Christchurch. My dad is very funny. He’s got an awesome sense of humour. We grew up watching Monty Python and Wallace And Gromit – very much British character comedy. It influenced a lot of what I find funny now.
Tell me about your first stand-up gig.
I don’t really do stand-up now. I wouldn’t class what I do as stand-up. I tried doing stand-up when I was about 27. I tried just for one year. I did the Raw Comedy at Auckland at The Classic, which is a whole bunch of comedians giving it a go for the first time. And I did terribly, I thought. I hated it. It was so scary. With theatre and comedy and improv, it’s awesome if you get them to laugh but they aren’t expecting that. It’s more like a happy accident. With stand-up, you’re just standing there looking directly at the audience going, ‘Please laugh at my jokes’.
How would your friends describe you?
I reckon they would say clumsy. I’m a very clumsy person. Maybe motherly. I tend to be quite motherly like a camp mum. I like to feed people. And I don’t know how to put this but I’ve got a dark sense of humour.
Who are the funniest people you know?
Snort, the improv group that I’m with. There are maybe 20 of us now. Those people are making the best comedy in the industry right now. They are all so funny – with a special mention to Kura Forrester. Every moment I’m with her, I’m cracking up.
Loves:
• All sorts of ramen. I’ve been to Japan twice. The last time I was there I went by myself by accident. My partner and I were planning on going but he got an acting job back here. So I ended up going by myself. So I was like, ‘Well I can do whatever I want’. I just ate ramen every minute of the day.
• A YouTube channel that Rose Matafeo got me on to. It is called Liziqi. Basically it’s beautiful. It’s not a comedy. It’s a young Chinese woman who makes food and clothes and stuff from scratch.
• RuPaul’s Drag Race is my favourite TV show of all time. I’ve been watching it since season three. It used to be this underground show and not many people watched it but then all of a sudden, in the past five years, it’s gone mainstream. It’s a reality show with drag queens and it’s so good.
Hates:
• Polycystic Ovary Syndrome (a hormonal condition). That’s been plaguing me for the last however many years and it’s just a bloody annoyance. It’s one of those conditions where it’s not curable, it’s just manageable. You sort of put in all this effort and nothing really happens. So you’ve got to learn to learn to live with that.
• Our courier drivers have been dropping all of our parcels to the house next door because they are unit two and we’re number two. We’re not getting our parcels. Maybe this is at the front of my psyche at the moment.
• A brown avocado. I always have green ones and then try to ripen them up. You spend all this time nurturing this beautiful avocado and then you just have no idea what’s going to be on the inside. If it turns out to be all brown and mushy and gross on the inside it’s such a letdown.
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