★★★☆☆

Review by Tony Frame. Venue 33. Pleasance Courtyard – Beside @ 15:35

As soon as you enter the venue at the Pleasance you are handed a pen and notepad before you take a seat. This is intriguing, I thought, as I sat and sipped my drink with the others in the audience, and then the show began…

Kristin Mcilquham’s  solo show is predominantly about grief and the difficult relationship she had with her father. She takes us through a couple of decades of her life, aided with musical arrangements from popular TV shows of the time (Funhouse with Pat Sharp, for example), and songs that you would have heard on Top of the Pops in the ‘80s. It’s great for the nostalgia vibe, especially if you are in that age group, like I am.

At heart the show is a kitchen-sink drama with lots of humour (more chuckles than belly laughs), but for me, it became a mixed-bag of genres which I think took the focus from the crux of the story. For instance, Kristin addresses the audience a few times, like a stand-up comedian would do, and asks questions to which those in the audience will put their hands up if they are in the demographic of the question asked. This doesn’t really lead anywhere that serves the show for the better (I think), and if anything, it allowed one or two audience members to feel like they could chat to each other for a moment because the fourth wall had been broken.

The notepads you are given only serve the purpose for one scenario, and again, I thought this was a wasted opportunity, although I did understand the significance of it in relation to her story. There was also some audience participation which had its moments, but I felt it slowed the show down (to an extent), and it felt more applicable to an outright comedy show than a drama with comedy in it.

I understand this show is very important to Kristin, and I get the reason she has made it, and I respect that a lot, but I just think if she had focused on condensing the story a little bit more and avoided breaking the fourth wall and the audience interaction then it would have had a stronger impact on the themes she was covering. The relationships, the characters – these were all good, I wanted more of that, and less of the aforementioned aspects.   

Ultimately, I liked it, I just didn’t love it, and that is just the way I felt from what I saw and observed. The one-hour running time went pretty fast in fairness, and the audience loved it (that’s what’s important!), and if energy and passion and natural acting ability alone were enough to give a Fringe show a 5 star-rating then Kristin Mcilquham would have had my vote without a shadow of a doubt.