The original title of Rob Carlton's first comedy show was Clearly Confused.
But when a friend said Carlton did not, in fact, appear to be confused at any time during the performance or the stories he told, he took the point and retitled it more accurately, Willing Participant.
"It's a line in the show that will surprise the audience when it comes," he says.
And there's more to the show than that.
In all four of the stories the 52-year-old actor tells, he was, indeed, a willing participant in what happened - good or bad, funny or poignant.
"The show is a celebration of what it is to be alive."
Carlton knew one of the organisers of the Canberra Comedy Festival who, knowing he had comedy experience, albeit not in stand-up, asked if he had anything that might be suitable. After a warm-up performance in Avoco Beach on the central coast of NSW where he lives, he brought the show to Canberra.
It played to 120 people in the Courtyard Studio and the festival organisers liked it so much they asked him to bring it back this year so more people could see it.
In the meantime he'd polished it and performed at the Adelaide Fringe where it garnered rave reviews. These stories have legs.
The first of them concerns what he delicately calls a friend's "sexual indiscretion" that happened in Canberra some decades ago.
Carlton spent five days discussing the indiscretion and the issues surrounding it with some friends, including the person who did it, while watching a match at the Sydney Cricket Ground over five days.
If the match had lasted 10 days they'd have discussed it for 10 days, Carlton says.
"It's that time of your life when you've got time to discuss thousands of hypotheticals and pause for thought."
The second story tells of an incident that also took place in his 20s.
He got a job as a continuity supervisor - the person who makes sure elements like clothes and props match between shots - and was flown to a film set. The only problem was he'd never done the job before.
"It was one of my greatest acting roles ever."
Carlton says in those stories, he was "a young man figuring out how to behave, what to do".
The third story is from the more recent past, in 2015.
Carlton's father Jim, a politician who had been health minister in Malcolm Fraser's government, died that year at the age of 80 and was cremated.
Left with the ashes in a box, Carlton felt uncomfortable.
"I'd never felt uncomfortable with my father when he was alive. I didn't know how to behave."
"I took his ashes for a bike ride," Carlton says.
Even more recently, Carlton was asked to audition for a major stage musica, except he didn't think he could sing.
"I said 'No' a number of times," he says.
But the musical director persisted, saying he could "talk-sing" like Rex Harrison in My Fair Lady.
While this might have been considered something of an insult - "I wanted to sound like Sting!"- Carlton finally decided he was up for the challenge and began preparing, with vocal lessons and plenty of practice.
We can't give away too much about the stories, of course, but Carlton says they have resonated with people aged between 15 and 90 and, apart from a bit of swearing, are suitable for anyone.
Even apart from this show, Carlton has had a busy couple of years. He was in the Netflix adaptation of Trent Dalton's Boy Swallows Universe - "It had an amazing cast, it was fun doing it" - among other screen roles and with his wife Adrienne Ferreira hosts Bravewords Live, a monthly event in Gosford where people, some professional writers, some not, tell true stories about their lives.
Carlton not only tells his own stories, he helps others tell theirs.
Willing Participant is on at the Courtyard Studio, Canberra Theatre Centre, on Saturday March 23 at 5pm. Mild language warning. Recommended for ages 15+. See: canberratheatrecentre.com.au.
