Edinburgh Fringe comedy review
Even after 12 years on the circuit, Lauren Pattison retains visible traces of the anxiety that fuels most of her work. She’s the first to admit that she never makes eye contact with the audience and, in the unlikely event of a heckler, would do her best to ignore it until it went away.
The theme of wanting to be braver neatly ties together all the anecdotes in this hour, which often relate to funny confrontations she’s had with unreasonable audience members (there’s a routine about an angry woman at one of her shows with a great punchline), and much more reasonable family members (ditto the story about her boyfriend not buying her earrings).
The questions of when and how to be brave come to a head in two strands, as Pattison relates her struggle to learn how to drive and a fated intervention with her closest friend, which together provide the meat of the show’s emotional impact.
Learning to drive was a real challenge for Pattison. She spent 186 hours on the road with her saintly instructor until, between them, they managed to find the right approach to boost her confidence enough to get her through the test, but even after passing she still felt scared every time she got in the car.
These stories about feeling anxious and then inspirationally overcoming it occasionally have a cyclical or drawn-out aspect. Four solo shows into her career and you can detect the increased currency that a good story has for her, and the impetus to string two or three of them into a whole hour. Happily, she’s settled into the role of storyteller, and gets a lot of juice out of her premises, although some of the wackier lines sometimes strain credulity.
As the show progresses, she unearths a number of social issues that you wish she’d get into a little more. It’s great to hear her talk about the lack of education around women’s health, and the maddening aspects of British drinking culture that fosters alcoholism and then ignores the consequences. If she could bring herself to be a little more confrontational, she’d probably have some pretty fierce political comedy on her hands. As it is, they’re offered up slightly apologetically for the most part.
Although it could stand to be brought out more, if the show is about anything it’s about the idea that bravery means living in the face of adversity rather than necessarily overcoming it.
Pattison still doesn’t look at her audience when performing and she still speaks a mile a minute to avoid anyone piping up that she might have to deal with, just like she still feels sick whenever she gets in the car, but she puts on the titular pants and does it anyway.
Published: 25 Aug 2024
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