War Donkey
Bridget Christie: War Donkey ★★★★
Written by Tracey Lowe in ThePublicReviews.com on August 11th, 2012
Bridget Christie is a bit of a staple at the Edinburgh Fringe.
Her surreal, bonkers shows may not have the masses clamouring to see her, but she draws consistent, appreciative audiences. And more importantly, she seems to be having a whale of a time performing.
This year’s show is based around attitudes towards women in comedy, a subject clearly close to Christie’s heart. But before she gets into the more conventional material, she baffles audience members by taking to the stage in a deflated fat suit. However, she does explain why it will be used later, resulting in one of the biggest belly laughs in the show.
Christie’s style is brilliantly unique, starting with the surreal and moving into quite thought-provoking stuff on feminist issues. It’s a real surprise shift in tone, but she never comes across as dictatorial or overly-political. She raises awareness of important issues in a friendly, humorous way. While dressed as a donkey.
Her final story about negative experiences in a bookshop is extremely clever, planting names of feministic authors in the brains of potentially interested audience members, as well as relying on a guaranteed laugh-provoking technique, the fart. Even the way she gets the audience to leave is wonderfully subversive.
Bridget Christie is not only a brilliant comedian, she is also fiercely intelligent.
Crazy and clever in equal doses, she is totally unique, and obliterates the myth that women aren’t funny.
Christie shows they can be funny, politically aware, friendly, warm, but most importantly, completely nuts.
Written by Tracey Lowe in ThePublicReviews.com on 11th August 2012.
Filed Under: War Donkey, Review