Showing @ Heroes @ Bob’s Bookshop, Edinburgh until Mon 26 Aug @ 22:00
Any seasoned visitor to the Edinburgh Fringe comedy circuit will be aware of its terrifyingly diverse nature. Take a punt on a stand-up and you could be in for anything between an hour of absurdist train-of-thought wonderings, to a intense ten minute barrage of misogynistic abuse. That’s just how it goes, and Adrienne Truscott has no intention of challenging such freedom of performance (after all, her own treads risky ground), but it seems she does take issue with rape jokes. Especially the unfunny ones.
Focussing mainly on stateside comedians (though Jimmy Carr doesn’t escape unscathed), Truscott deftly addresses rape-culture and its tendency to infect the world of popular comedy. In doing so, she manages a tightrope walk between warmth and steely confidence; there’s a sense that any heckle hurled at her would simply shrivel in the air before impact. The ditzy, brash persona that Truscott adopts is likeable and sharp throughout her whirlwind of half-naked, gin-soaked ramblings. More than that though, this is a piece of bona-fide feminist performance art within which Truscott manages to symbiotically provoke and amuse. But then, that’s only to be expected: women are terrific at multi-tasking.