The new ABC series that will give you hope for the future of local comedy

January 28, 2025 journo

Optics
4 stars
ABC, Wednesdays, 8.30pm/ ABC iview

Jenna Owen and Vic Zerbst have been performing as sketch-comedy duo Freudian Nip (with occasional other members) for a decade now, most notably on SBS’s news satire series The Feed. But it was a viral video in 2023 for the Voice to Parliament referendum, costarring Indigenous rapper Briggs, that introduced the pair to a wider audience (their Chaser skit as teenage contact tracers during the pandemic was another hit).

Jenna Owen, left, and Vic Zerbst as Nicole and Greta in <i>Optics</i>.” src=”https://static.ffx.io/images/$zoom_0.138%2C$multiply_0.7725%2C$ratio_1.5%2C$width_756%2C$x_0%2C$y_12/t_crop_custom/q_86%2Cf_auto/440f2c74338913bb769bb086b2e62fe19398bf2b” height=”390″ width=”584″ srcset=”https://static.ffx.io/images/$zoom_0.138%2C$multiply_0.7725%2C$ratio_1.5%2C$width_756%2C$x_0%2C$y_12/t_crop_custom/q_86%2Cf_auto/440f2c74338913bb769bb086b2e62fe19398bf2b, https://static.ffx.io/images/$zoom_0.138%2C$multiply_1.545%2C$ratio_1.5%2C$width_756%2C$x_0%2C$y_12/t_crop_custom/q_62%2Cf_auto/440f2c74338913bb769bb086b2e62fe19398bf2b 2x”></picture></div><figcaption class=

Last year, they made their film debut as writers and stars of the Stan Christmas film Nugget Is Dead, and now they’ve teamed with The Chaser’s Charles Firth to create and co-write Optics.

Zerbst is Greta Goldman and Owen is Nicole Kidman (no, it’s never explained), juniors at prestige PR firm Fritz & Randell, run by middle-aged men who exclude them from most meetings.

That is, until CEO Frank Fritz (Peter Carroll) dies during a meeting. Ian Randell (Charles Firth), son of the original founder, assumes he will take the reins, but the firm’s owner Bobby (Claude Jabbour, permanently accompanied by his bodyguard/PA Dod, played by Aaron Collins), has other ideas. He promotes the girls to co-CEOs – “subject to board approval” – before leaving them to deal with a football player who’s been filmed punching a priest.

<i>The Chaser</i>’s Charles Firth, co-creator of <i>Optics</i>, also stars as Ian Randell.” loading=”lazy” src=”https://static.ffx.io/images/$zoom_0.138%2C$multiply_0.7725%2C$ratio_1.5%2C$width_756%2C$x_0%2C$y_12/t_crop_custom/q_86%2Cf_auto/bfd2dff681f4cdf6207e8a42125d03cf396b90e7″ height=”390″ width=”584″ srcset=”https://static.ffx.io/images/$zoom_0.138%2C$multiply_0.7725%2C$ratio_1.5%2C$width_756%2C$x_0%2C$y_12/t_crop_custom/q_86%2Cf_auto/bfd2dff681f4cdf6207e8a42125d03cf396b90e7, https://static.ffx.io/images/$zoom_0.138%2C$multiply_1.545%2C$ratio_1.5%2C$width_756%2C$x_0%2C$y_12/t_crop_custom/q_62%2Cf_auto/bfd2dff681f4cdf6207e8a42125d03cf396b90e7 2x”></picture></div><figcaption class=

Fritz & Randell specialises in crisis management, minimising damage when celebrities, businesses and sportsmen (is it ever sportswomen?) are caught misbehaving on social media, bullying staff, or being called out for problematic behaviour.

Greta and Nicole – chronically online 20-somethings who can post on TikTok while discussing an entirely different matter in under 30 seconds – have been thrown in at the deep end, but their enterprising strategies, workshopped in rapid-fire banter so fast it’s hard to keep up with the biting dialogue, actually seem to work.

They concoct “Pre-Menstrual Dysphoric Disorder” – “something the misogynistic medical profession struggles to diagnose” – to save a female entrepreneur (Grey’s Anatomy’s Kate Walsh) accused of bullying; strike a deal with a dodgy regulator to save the face of airline Qalitus (!) and when a Hollywood actor’s skin-collecting “habit” is exposed, they spin the bad press into “kink-shaming”.

Meanwhile, a despondent Ian works on low-profile cases, while Greta and Kate try to nail down their contracts with the elusive Bobby. Slowly it becomes clear that they’ve been promoted for the optics and that Frank was harbouring secrets; office manager Meredith (Belinda Giblin) discovers several skeletons in the firm’s closets, and it seems these are about to be exposed.

It also dawns on Ian and the girls that they can use each other’s help. When Australia’s biggest telecoms company goes down and Kate and Greta are without their omnipresent phones, panic sets in. Apart from not being able to upload any “postable moments”, they can’t even order an Uber – and they need Ian’s help with a strategy.

Delightfully cynical (it’s about PR, after all), with swipes at just about everyone (the intergenerational sparring apparently inspired by Owen and Zerbst’s experiences working with Firth), the series is also a dig at “glass cliffing”; as opposed to the glass ceiling, a glass cliff is when women are promoted only when a company is in trouble and needs good optics.

There’s a terrific ensemble of guest stars, including Rhys Muldoon, Mandy McElhinney and Nakkiah Lui, but Optics belongs to Owen and Zerbst – these two will give you hope for the next generation of Australian comedy.

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