Eleanor Conway: Talk Dirty To Me
Laughing Horse @ The Walrus (Raised Room)
on Fri 06 May 2022 21:30
This was a blast!
Comedian Eleanor Conway hadn’t dented my consciousness as a performer before last night but I am very glad she has now. This, her first night’s performance in Brighton was an all singing, all dancing, explorative work in progress; unpicking women’s lives , sex, lust, choosing to be childfree and the delights (or not) of online dating.
Eleanor Conway is an award winning comedian and her shows cover issues including does sex, addiction (she’s been clear of drink and drugs for eight years now) and dating.
Conway is a comedy dynamo. I and the audience were with her and laughing from the beginning of the show, through to the end. Whilst this is a preview show for Edinburgh Festival and a work in progress, it already felt like the themes of the show were clear and drily lined out with a hearty does of black humour. This ultimately, just needs a wee bit of polishing to buff them into a final show.
Picking over the nightmare that is Tinder Gold, she explores dating for heterosexual women in the 21st century, men who advertise themselves as ‘No more drama’. Moving on to the pitfalls of dating men with kids, and the accompanying coterie of resentful stepchildren, whilst also trying out little vignettes from her own life and new parts of her show.
Exploring the ‘sometime in the future’ thinking of men who may want kids some day, despite the fact that they are currently in their 50s, was pretty apt from my own online dating travails. She looked at ‘the cruel joke of motherhood’, and the epic nature of project managing that entails, but with a new spin on it in a feminist, and funny way.
Leading with a very funny comedy strand around a short term boyfriend’s smelly willy (she used other words!), which both men and women in the audience loudly cackled at, she then mused on legacy sperm trapped in used condoms in bins just waiting for single women of a certain age to run off with the raw material. She’s angry with the patriarchy, but there’s a lot of amusing material to be had within that.
There were lots of sex based gags and the audience lapped them up riotously. I loved how she could switch from filthily witty asides to more comprehensive comments on women, feminism and the sexual act. I’m aware that won’t go on a flyer, but it was very skilfully achieved, and to big belly laughs from us all.
Selling out 3 tours worldwide with her shows ‘Walk of Shame 1 & 2’ and ’You May Recognise Me From Tinder’, this show was very funny indeed and I laughed uproariously throughout.
Go and see it, she’s in town all month and I would happily watch this all over again!
Brighton Fringe Shows
07 May 2022 21:30 – 22:30
