Sarah Keyworth launched their standup profession with two considerate solo exhibits deconstructing gender and the that means of “boy” and “lady”. Now they establish as “an emotionally unstable non-binary individual”, with a brand new present about their current prime surgical procedure. The thoughtfulness is a continuing – centered right here not on Keyworth’s causes for looking for surgical procedure, and much much less on wider views on gender realignment, however on the extra upbeat query of how that physique alteration has been skilled by Keyworth and their shut household.
As we count on from Keyworth, it finds a comic measuring out their materials with nice management, to the slight detriment of spontaneity. However the 30-year-old is aware of learn how to architect a giant snicker. There’s a fantastic one-liner about gender pronouns, and a neat reversal that finds Keyworth eagerly welcoming transphobic feedback beneath her on-line movies. A operating joke imagines the east Midlander’s gender journey because the creepy quest of a sister to be extra like her brother.
Amid the gags in regards to the delicate indignities of the pre-op course of, the superficial advantages of breast elimination, and Keyworth’s magically relocated nipples, two set-piece anecdotes about lesbian life show crowd-pleasing too – even when they co-opt a couple of sexuality cliches to realize the impact. A piece teasing on the battered repute of males, in dialogue with Keyworth’s viewers, has a decrease comedian yield.
The overarching story traces our host’s relationship with their mom specifically, from stroppy adolescence (very convincingly delivered to life), by way of current discovery of their mother and father’ hedonistic youth, to Keyworth’s mum’s response to her daughter’s mastectomy. It’s affectionately instructed by the comic, in a present that – lastly, and sentimentally – celebrates household love and acceptance. There’s a key piece of data withheld till the later phases, although, which feels a bit manipulative, and opens a window on a compelling and extra complicated a part of the story that’s largely untold.
Perhaps I felt that solely as a result of this story of main surgical procedure is in any other case so conspicuously untroubled. Nevertheless it was a life-changing, optimistic expertise for Keyworth, in spite of everything, which interprets right here into a fascinating and touching one for audiences.
