REDEFINING THE PUNCHLINE

Creative expression seems to be a family affair for Farah Lola after all, she has a stand-up comedian and a rapper for brothers. Still, she’s boldly forging her own path as a sketch star with an arsenal of hilarious characters, and pushing herself to explore more serious roles as an actor.

- Lin Yanqin

“Oh gosh, am I a nepo baby?” quips Farah Lola, when I ask if having a famous standup comedian brother has helped her career.

With six years of comedy under her belt, the 31-year-old is unfazed by criticism or haters. In a world dominated by Instagram and Tiktok, her motto when it comes to girding herself against social media mockery is to “make fun of yourself before people make fun of you”.

“I have a self-deprecating sense of humour, but it’s not out of like, hating myself. It’s like… I’m gonna put it out there first [so] you can’t hurt me,” she shares.

For the record, although her older brother Fakkah Fuzz is a successful standup comedian with his own special on Netflix, Farah’s comedy work occupies a whole other domain – sketch comedy – and is 100 per cent her own. Aside from offering support and encouragement, Fakkah is not at all involved with her work.

“My whole family, we’re very supportive of one another’s careers. So we’re always sharing or commenting, or we are just very visibly together in social media… and yeah, maybe that helped in my views, but I came up with a lot of work myself,” says Farah.

That work includes an early sketch from 2018 that gained online traction – a parody of influencer “unboxing” videos in which she unpacked groceries from the wet market – to an arsenal of personas (coy “xiaomeimei”, a grumpy “minah” barista, “Asian girl with an ang moh boyfriend”).

She also has a knack for saying the things everyone is thinking but lack the nerve to say out loud.