Biography.
Asher spent his early years sat in the back of an army green panel van driving up and down the east coast of Australia with his Hippy/Bogan (Hogan) parents. He grew up in Byron Bay and attended Mullumbimby High School where he was expelled from year eight Drama for ‘not being serious enough.’ Soon afterwards he packed his bags, moved to Melbourne and attempted to enrol in a pilot course for the National Institute of Circus Arts. Asher was accepted as a ‘sublicant’ to prove to funding organisations NICA’s capacity for polishing a turd.
In 2006 Asher moved to London, there he met comedian Robin Ince and was inducted into the infamous Book Club. There he found himself working alongside comedians like Josie Long, Stewart Lee and Stephen Merchant and, in this environment of incomprehensible art wank, he flourished. In 2009 with the assistance of a Moosehead Grant he earned his first critical success with a nomination for the 2009 Barry Award at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival. Then in 2010, his third show ‘Secret Door’ went gangbusters and won him the Age Newspapers Critics Choice Award and garnered Asher a Best Newcomer Nomination at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2010. Since that time Asher has written 6 solo comedy shows, which he has toured nationally and internationally.
In 2016 he began his most ambitious project to date, Peter and Bambi Heaven with Gypsy Wood. After the enormous success of their first outing in Edinburgh Peter and Bambi went onto the semi-finals of Frances Got Talent, headlined the unRoyal Variety Show and performed a short residency in Las Vegas with a show they cobbled together after firing the cast two days before opening. Unfortunately due to an incident involving a small audience fire and Visa issues associated with prior convictions, the Las Vegas season finished early. It was an extremely tumultuous year for the real life couple behind the show, which included them packing up house, moving overseas and touring a brand new show over 96 dates whilst in the midst of a break up. On the 10th of January 2016 Gypsy Wood and Asher Treleaven decided to end their eight- year marriage, they began full time rehearsals the next day. They then went on to tour five capital cities over seven months across two continents. Upon hearing this one can’t help but ask, why would anyone do this and what was it like pretending to be at the beginning of a flourishing fictional relationship on-stage and ending an actual relationship backstage? We don’t know if this is art-imitating life, life imitating art or a glimpse into some insane parallel universe where as one door closes another opens and out pops a Magical 80’s Power Couple from the Gold Coast. The best way to describe Peter and Bambi Heaven is, imagine if David Copperfield and Claudia Schiffer were from the Gold Coast now roll them in sequins set them on fire and you’re almost there.
Reviews.
“He is a cut-price Copperfield; a Gold Coast illusionist with a wardrobe full of bulge-revealing catsuits, she his romantic and performing partner – a former cage dancer for whom old habits die hard – and together they promise ‘a splash of sun-drenched razzle-dazzle’ as they mix magic and movement. Cue daggy dancing to Steve Miller’s Abracadabra – what else? – purposeful, intense stares and costume changes galore.” – Chortle.