Laughter in the Face of Heartbreak: Fringe Shows Tackle Painful Breakups
Two comedy shows at the fringe festival explore the experience of painful breakups, using innovative forms to express the emotions and struggles of the performers.
Breakups are a universal experience that can be both agonizing and liberating. Two comedy shows at the fringe festival are tackling this complex emotion, using innovative forms to express the pain and struggle of the performers.
## A Journey of Self-Discovery
Elf Lyons' show, The Woman on the Edge, is a poignant exploration of her own breakup experience. The show is a unique blend of standup, drama, and music, with Lyons playing a Norma Desmond-alike alter ego. The conceit is that the show is being performed by a brittle and wise-cracking refugee from vintage Hollywood, who is trying to keep at bay her husband, the clown Pagliacci, on the end of the phone.
| Show | Form | Description | | --- | --- | --- | | The Woman on the Edge | 1/3 standup, 1/3 drama, 1/3 music | A unique blend of comedy, drama, and music | | Echo | 1/3 play, 1/3 standup, 1/3 rave | A primal scream with repetitive beats | | Bringing It All Back Home | Standup | A gleefully juvenile sexual candour with a flat voice and sexless demeanour |
The show is a powerful exploration of Lyons' journey, from the shards of a disintegrating sense of self to a fierce finale in which she claws back something defiant, celebratory even, from the wreckage of her love life. The surreal and aphoristic running jokes are tart and emotionally charged, and the show is often beautifully funny and idiosyncratic.
## A Therapeutic Journey
Kate Dehnert's show, Echo, is a strikingly similar exploration of her own breakup experience. Dehnert's relationship with an unnamed fellow comedian was a decade old when he left her for another woman. Her sense of herself, and of the life she'd anticipated, collapses. She returns home to Australia to rebuild her life, and the show is a primal scream with repetitive beats.
Dehnert's analogy of choice is nuclear war, with her life reduced to a blasted post-apocalyptic landscape of confusion, depression, and rage. She has to de-programme herself, and tries edging back towards coupledom - cue an unlovely dirty-talking skit with a man on a dating app. The show's therapeutic journey towards "self-actualisation" is more conventional than Lyons', but it's no less emotionally charged.
## A Different Perspective
Ele McKenzie's debut, Bringing It All Back Home, is a different take on the breakup experience. McKenzie takes the breakup in her stride, and focuses on the aftermath: a move back in to her parents' house, and a reckoning with her arrested development as a 30-year-old trapped in her childhood home.
The show is an eye-catching introduction to the work of a comic who recently starred in the BBC sitcom Funboys. McKenzie exploits for all its worth the mismatch between her gleefully juvenile sexual candour and the flat voice and sexless demeanour that back it up. The imagined May-to-September romance with Bob Dylan into which the show evolves is both blissfully silly and covertly expressive of her eagerness to bond with a dad who treats her less as daughter, more as colleague.
The three shows offer a unique perspective on the experience of painful breakups, using innovative forms to express the emotions and struggles of the performers. Whether it's Lyons' powerful exploration of her own journey, Dehnert's primal scream of rage and confusion, or McKenzie's gleefully juvenile take on the aftermath, each show offers a compelling and emotionally charged experience.
The shows are all playing at the Pleasance Courtyard until 30 August, with The Woman on the Edge continuing until 31 August.
