Fringe Binge 2017 Show #48 - Sophie Willan - Branded; Pleasance Courtyard, 2000, 15-Aug-17

I had seen Ms. Willan at last year's Fringe (see here) - being dragged up onstage to learn to dance (the twerk, the tit-shimmy and the hip square) traumatised me for some time. That show was excellent but also quite harrowing given the subject matter so I hadn't actually bought any tickets for this year's show. However I had read a number of good reviews and decided to see this one.

I'm glad I did. Ms. Willan is quite the bundle of energy and bounded in (sadly the setup of the small theatre wasn't conducive to her clambering through us this time), dancing around the stage, shimmying at various folks and generally getting the atmosphere going. The introduction to the show was her chatting to various audience members (she lives in Manchester, and there was quite the contingent of Mancunians in).

She explained that after the previous year's show she had received quite a bit of media interest. She ticked a number of boxes - a woman, northern, working-class (proper working-class, not some Southern dandy pretending to be, while hiding his First in PPE from Oxbridge). This made her "grittily authentic". And so the theme of the bulk of the show was set - she was branded and labelled by the media, dominated as it is by white, respectable, middle-class, earnest professionals (similar to themes developed earlier by Twayna Mayne) and this stereotyping provoked expectations about behaviour, background and attitude. As you might imagine Ms. Willan did not fit into any of the neat little silos she was being forced into ...

She talked about her own background - drug-addict mother, coming into possession of her complete social-work file (the theme of last year's show), living with her grandmother, being convinced Richard Ashcroft of the Verve was her Dad (SPOILER - he isn't, but the story is a good one). Lots of family tales. Good punchlines, energetically and enthusiastically told.

The final part of the show really demonstrated her point about labelling and how people react to the label, rather than the person. She revealed something about herself and her past. I won't spoil it but I certainly didn't see it coming. And, of course, she was absolutely correct. The revelation brought with it lots of respectable middle-class cliched mental reactions - reacting to the label - which she totally refuted given her own experiences. I'm being deliberately vague here as if you get the chance to see her perform this show the less you know the better.

It was a great show, with an enthusiastic, honest and open performance from Ms. Willan and genuinely affecting and thought-provoking ideas. It's a shame her show is in such a relatively small space as more people need to go and see her - one of the best shows of my Fringe trip thus far.