Rebel Wilson is what Cartman would be were he older, Australian, female – and human.

Her persona is equally whiney, stubborn and arrogant; an embittered High School misfit, rejected by all the cool kids who tease her for being fat and ugly. And while beauty might only be skin deep, this character’s ugliness runs to the core, as demonstrated by the racist insults she tosses out to the Asians in her class.

And therein lies the main problem with this as a show. Wilson’s character is so unlikeable and unsympathetic it’s hard to stomach a whole hour in her company. The grating ‘and I was like so…’ teenage patois in which she speaks magnifies the effect. It may be proof that the character is so well realised, but it doesn’t make it any the more enjoyable.

Here she tells of her participation in a school exchange programme, staying with a family even more unlikeable than she is: unrepentant, gun-toting Afrikaans pining for the return of apartheid, the difference between their black domestic staff and slaves only nominal. It is, apparently, based on her genuine experiences of an exchange trip to South Africa as a teenager.

Wilson wrings out the laughs in the breathtakingly inappropriate behaviour of herself and her hosts; though not quite enough of them to sustain the interest. And, as so many fat female comics do, she overestimates the inherent comedy of her graceless dancing.

Her meticulous, quirky characterisation may showcase the talents that have already given her a solid foothold as a comic actress, but there needs to be a bit more attention to the script.

Reviewed by: Steve Bennett
Melbourne, April 2005