I had seen Mary Bourke a couple of times - in her solo show and as part of a compilation show - and had really enjoyed her previous incarnation as Ireland's only housewife/rapper, so I was looking forward to this one.
The theme, as you might be able to tell, was supposed to be about being Irish in a post-Brexit world but was really a string of loosely-connected anecdotes generally themed around Irish stereotypes and how others see Ireland versus what she saw of her own country.
Ms. Bourke is quite an understated comic, with great delivery and a skewering wit. She proceeded to disembowel quite a few targets. She spent a lot of time deconstructing Ed Sheeran's Galway Girl for its blatant stereotypes ("She played a fiddle in an Irish band? Could you get any more cliched? And nice of Ed to remind us we're in Ireland ..."), useless geography (there are no pubs on Grafton Street) and various other lyrics. Suffice it to say he didn't come out of it well. She also spent some time suggesting alternative traditional songs that could be sung instead of the godawful Danny Boy (written by an American) - one of which was a staggeringly moving ballad about lost love and a heart-broken woman clinging onto the grave in desperation; a happy, cheery, upbeat tune. A rather amusing tale about a brand of gin stocked by Aldi called Cromwell Gin, which, as well as being informative (no, I didin't know much about Cromwell's genocide in Ireland) also taught us not to mess with pensioners, a group of whom launched a multi-pronged barrage of communication the way of Aldi who eventually agreed to take it off their shelves.
The routine concluded with a tale of an egomaniac American comic with whom she shared a bill at a gig in Dublin (she didn't give his name) who was so full of self-confidence and self-belief it was nauseating. Anyway, when it was his turn to perform he bounced on to stage, swaggered up to the microphone and yelled, "Hello Dublin! It's good to be back in the UK ..." It's fair to say he lost the audience at that point. I won't spoil the story but it has a cracking punchline with a nice post-script.
Sadly no tips as to how to get an Irish passport so I'll need to pursue other exit strategies. But it was a great show, Ms. Bourke is a great performer and the show is well worth going to see.
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