Melbourne International Comedy Festival review

If there are few frills to Bronwyn Kuss’s cynical stand-up, it could be because the one-store Queensland town of Peak Crossings where she grew up is a place where simplicity reigns. 

Yet her dry-as-the-outback delivery – deadpan without being dull – is hugely effective, with her sharp jokes all the more impactful for being so casually underplayed. 

In keeping with her droll, no-nonsense style, there’s no predominant theme to I’ll Allow It, but it’s fluid and well-put together nonetheless. Wryly amusing storytelling comes naturally to her – or at least seems to – so there’s no need to flaunt the craftsmanship that underpins it. It’s a style that screams confidence, and rightly so.

The nonchalant pace – slightly more upbeat that previously, although that was a very low baseline – comes with a fine sense of timing and an even finer sense of sarcasm. If she shows a lack of empathy, then she has an emotionally distant family to credit for that, and their oddities amusingly described here.

It makes her instinctively derisive about almost everything,  especially herself, but her low expectations make her almost celebratory about life’s imperfections.

That’s best illustrated by her story of crossing America on a Greyhound bus at that time in her life when, like so many young people, she has just enough money to go overseas but not enough money to enjoy any of it. That’s how she pithily puts it, anyway.

First-hand stories such as the peculiar games she invented with her brother or her fears of being replaced by AI while in an office drone job have excellent payoffs, especially unexpected in the latter’s case. And when she points her sardonic attention outwards to the likes of billionaires wanting to live forever, her sneers can be even more pointed. 

It all makes for a superior package of unforced, unpandering comedy, full of strong laughs from tales that ring true.

Review date: 5 Apr 2025
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett
Reviewed at: Melbourne International Comedy Festival