This was one of the big shows for me. I am a big fan of Ms. Stevenson and having seen her last two Fringe shows (see reviews here and here) I was really looking forward to this one. I was most certainly not disappointed although it was a tad different in style which I'll get to.
The general theme can best be summed up by paraphrasing her own words, "I'm not right-wing, I'm not left-wing, I'm 'What the FUCK is happening?'"
Walking on stage, music cuts out and boom ... straight into a very funny menstrual anecdote ("That's made the men comfortable. Straight into the period stuff ..."). There then followed a very funny, passionate and eloquent hour or so of ... well, thematically similar to previous shows I've seen but with an undercurrent, something that I think is bubbling under in many of the shows this year. Namely an immense exasperation and frustration at the state of the world today. Wherever you look there's intolerance, greed, war, poverty - and overnight the invective between the US and North Korea had been ramped up ("Well done Edinburgh. We're on the brink of a nuclear holocaust and you think 'Fuck it, let's go to a comedy show'" - a similar line would be repeated in further shows) and I think this feeling of frustration was weaved through Ms. S's show. Oh, there are plenty of laughs too but they're all tempered somewhat by this feeling of anger in the face of insanity like Brexit, Grenfell Tower, Trump, ISIS, etc., etc.
Again, to emphasise, it's a great show and Ms. S is a consummate performer. But even a more light-hearted routine, such as putting your make-up on on the train or the frustration at the use of the phrase "speaking as a Mother", is tempered by the intolerance, sexism, prejudices and egomania of many men and women. Last year her final big routine was an epic tale about being immensely drunk in Paris, getting the Eurostar back to London with an epic hangover, meeting a guy on the train and ultimately receiving that most unwelcome of gifts - a dick pic. Plenty of sexism there but it was hugely funny. The big final routine this year was set the day after the Westminster Bridge terror attack and recounted her reactions to a coloured chap getting on the tube with a rucksack and sitting opposite her - while there was still a punchline and hugely funny asides it was a meditation on her own, and by extension our own, failings with tolerance and understanding.
That summary may have put some people off but please don't be. Ms. S is a fabulous storyteller and outstanding performer and the show is excellent. There's a heightened level of anger at so many facets of the world - similar themes other shows are also exploring - that it's not a disengage-brain-and-giggle show. It's excellent and you should go.
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