Michelle Brasier isn’t just a name on a poster — she’s something of an Australian cultural institution. The girl from Wagga Wagga — which, she gleefully informs us, is the teenage pregnancy capital of the world — has bulldozed her way to the top of the musical-comedy game. She’s the sort of performer who makes you want to revisit every questionable life choice you’ve ever made, then laugh about it. If brains were microchips, hers would be an NVIDIA AI running on turbo, still managing to crack a joke while demolishing you in karaoke.

The show kicks off in a swirl of personal anxieties and public regrets — hers, yours, ours — before freefalling into a glorious rollercoaster: self-shame, the Roman Empire and the absurdity of TikTok therapy. This is her origin story told at breakneck pace: from shy schoolgirl to all-consuming drama sponge. She’s lived it, absorbed it, and polished it until it’s sharp enough to cut glass.

Brasier’s also a dyed-in-the-wool nerd, and her pop-culture references hit home. To her, Star Wars isn’t George Lucas’s shiny space opera — it’s the messy, human soap opera of critics and the star ratings they toss around like parade confetti. We get a gloriously unfiltered deep-dive into her obsession with reviews: baffling past write-ups, career-shaping snubs, and her audacious habit of directly messaging critics to ask why. It’s part comedy autopsy, part backstage gossip, part middle finger — and every beat lands.

Then there are the songs. Co-written with her partner Dan, they’re barnstorming numbers with wit, venom, and melodies that could headline a festival. The lyrics slice and sparkle, the delivery is immaculate, and her voice could melt glass or level a building, depending on her mood.

But here’s the turn — beneath the bite is real heart. This is also a show about the people you lose along the way: shifting friendships who once felt welded to your life but drifted into the ether, the ones you thought you’d grow old with but barely recognise now. She reconnects with some, unpicks the knots with others, and admits when the trail just goes cold.

By the end, you feel like you’ve seen a 90-minute show crammed into a breathless hour and all the better for it. Brasier’s the smartest person in the room, but the real magic is how she makes you feel like you’ve been hanging outside the room where the unfiltered gold and gossip gets traded.

She’s not just every woman — she’s everyone. People who claw their way up on raw talent, navigating a world that’s never entirely rooting for you. She’s Gen X grit, millennial meme fluency, and Gen Z chaos, all crammed into one high-voltage spark plug of a performer.

She signs off with a warm thank-you, a sly “Don’t tag me,” tossed at the note-taker in the corner, and a conspiratorial wink that makes you feel like you’ve just witnessed something slightly illicit. Whisper it — this might be one of the finest hours at the Fringe this year, but don’t tell her.