Edinburgh Fringe comedy review

At four years of age, Rachel Kaly told her mother that she wanted to kill herself in M&M’s World because she realised the red M&M wasn’t ketchup flavoured. We’ve probably all felt suicidal in M&M’s World, but that’s likely where the similarities end because Kaly has one of the most extreme and eventful biographies of any young comedian. 

Her Fringe debut Hospital Hour is extraordinarily generous with that biography – any other comedian could keep themselves in business through a hundred shows with the quantity of dramatic revelations contained herein, but Kaly just drops them one after another in an insane bombing run. Part of what makes the show so brilliant is her rejection of classical Fringe structure.

You don’t have to wait for the serious bit at the 45-minute mark where you’re invited to ponder the sad clown. You don’t even hear about a big trauma up top and then examine its fallout. Instead, every moment is equally suffused with horror, pathos and outrageous comedy, and no easy out is given.

Kaly’s narrative centres mostly on her relationship with her father, although he’s far from the only thorn in her side – a battery of seemingly random traumas led to diagnoses including OCD, bipolar disorder, depression and anxiety, for which she was eventually hospitalised over 200 times in her early 20s. 

She got her first period aged just 11, on the day that Saddam Hussein was hanged – an event which her father forced her to watch live on television, him sitting, her standing. The whole saga is delivered by Kaly in a medicated drone, a deadpan effect that perfectly serves her writing, which is brutally concise and studded with jewel-like details of misfortune.

If that much trauma sounds like a tough watch – well, it’s not without its challenges, but Kaly’s feelings about her backstory seem almost the opposite of raw, like picking over scorched earth. 

You’ll experience shock and you’ll laugh your ass off, but implausibly you’ll still come out with some kind of warped spring in your step. Having been in therapy since  September 12, 2001 and tried every treatment available, she is clearly beyond looking for sympathy, and instead is simply offering up the facts for their dark and immense comedic value. 

I’ve never seen a show that does quite what this show does, so it’s too bad that Kaly has had to leave the Fringe early. I sincerely hope she’s still in the running for awards consideration; I can’t imagine seeing a more essential show this year.

Review date: 14 Aug 2024
Reviewed by: Tim Harding
Reviewed at: Pleasance Courtyard