Georgie Carroll’s best life
Nurse-turned-comedian Georgie Carroll shares her infectious wit ahead of her Fringe show, Nurse Georgie Carroll: Infectious, at the Garden of Unearthly Delights.
What does your perfect day look like?
Well, there is definitely swimming, preferably in nature in the nude with some kind of ocean creatures dotted about, not stingrays or jellyfish, because I am naked. There would be me and my mam cooking food together and then feeding it to a table of people we love, plus some new people for good measure. I love people, especially new ones and want to meet everybody eventually. Next up, a shouty tequila-fuelled singalong in my piano bar with Elton/Gaga/Mayer at our summer house*. I would end the day floating around the house on the moat that I have converted into a lazy river.
*Georgie may not own a summer house with a piano bar.
What is a wonderful moment of kindness you have experienced?
I migrated to Adelaide from the UK in 2009 with little kids. In the first week or so, I was rain-soaked and rock bottom at Paradise Interchange with the kids because I had lost my car keys in the city somewhere. I was so fresh to the country I didn’t know where my husband worked, or which was my car in the car park. I had not one friend yet. A lady called Faye approached sensing something wasn’t going well and said, “are you ok, do you need help?” It is very hard to know how to be useful in the world, but that sentence is always a good opener. She took all three of us back to her house, fed us, gave us dry clothes, worked out where the Steve worked, located the keys and kept us till he could grab us. She was my first Australian mate and still a friend to this day.
What is your favourite photograph?
This is me snorkelling with turtles in Mexico!
If you could own any piece of art, what would it be?
It would be the above photo, made as a golden statue with a water fountain attachment. It would go in the moat/lazy river.
Here’s $500. You have to spend it in the next hour – what are you buying?
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Part of a pair of glasses. I have worn glasses since I was a child and always went function-over-fashion until I hit 50. I’m now in my ‘mad glasses, bold lip and chunky jewellery’ era. My penultimate era will be my ‘navy blue blazer, white capri pant and comfortable deck shoe’ era. The final one is the ‘braless, moomoo, crazy sun hat’ era. I will be wearing great glasses ’til the end. If you need a good glasses wing woman, optoMED blonde lady in Norwood is the bomb. She will break you down but build you bigger.
A bar/café/restaurant in SA you’d recommend?
That is such a hard question- I love anything from bakeries right through to degustations. If I see something on a menu I haven’t heard of, I want to try it. Topiary up in Tea Tree Gully is great for a quirky menu of locally-sourced stuff. You cannot go past the Fox and Firkin for the best UK pub grub, it has a great vibe too. My mates and our old ladies have a lunch club on Tuesdays where we either cook for each other or try a new place – Sankalp (Indian) at Hillcrest was a great surprise and bursting with flavour at a good price.
The last film you watched?
Haha, it was a bad choice – The New Avatar. My mates and I went with our mams. It was longer than test cricket, incredibly violent, script was atrocious (”I am going to die, but first I must push out this baby”)… It was so bad we all got the giggles. I think the moral was, ”we all need more bigger guns”. Bugonia was one I watched last week that I loved. Emma Stone does not make bad films – binge her whole back catalogue and if you disagree, I will fight you.
Favourite way to unwind?
To recap, there is water, I am in it, there is tequila and there is loud group singing with friends and strangers. I do have calmer hobbies too – I’m doing a jigsaw at the moment of an alpaca’s tea party. I love people watching too. A people-spotting win for me is spotting a well turned out super old wrinkly person sat on a bench looking at the sea eating an ice-cream. Is there anything more beautiful than that? I have to be really knackered before I truly relax, at which point I like to flop on the sofa with the husband and talk through his programs. He says he doesn’t love this, but I think he does.
Last book you read?
Reading is for me, the worst way to unwind. It’s just never a successful mission and it feels like a punishment. I get to page four and I am like ”Who is this Linda and why do I care?” and then I have to start again. The last book I remember completing and understanding was Forever by Judy Bloom when I was about 15. It’s I ironic that I hate reading yet have written a book, Off the Charts. I loved writing it; I am super proud of it. It’s not a novel from beginning to end; it’s a series of funny hospital-based editorials so you don’t have to finish the book in one go. I wrote it so I don’t have to read it.
Last song you listened to?
I am in a monogamous long term, long distance relationship with Jacob Collier’s music at the moment, he has no knowledge of this. If you haven’t Jacob Colliered, you need to. I first discovered him at last year’s Adelaide Cabaret Festival. I love taking a punt on people I haven’t heard of. I picked Jacob because of his poster, he was doing a star jump in a silver jump suit and I thought, who is this nerd? Then I saw the ticket price, and I was like this nerd probably has some skills. He has all the skills and all the joy and he turns audiences into choirs and play the keys on the piano and the strings in the piano at the same time. Grab yourself a cuppa and you tube “Jacob ollier improvises the National Symphony Orchestra”. Wow. His mums in that orchestra which makes it even more incredible. He is the uplifting genius we all need every now and again.
Georgie Carroll will be performing at The Garden of Unearthly Delights 2026 with her show, Nurse Georgie Carroll: Infectious, from 13 February – 22 March 2026.
