one4review | On 09, Aug 2025

Rachel Galvo with this show unapologetically makes a space for comedy by and primary about women. She commands the stage in a way that is emblematic of an apparent trend for women in comedy: doing comedy that is properly their own, rather than having to adapt and bend to fit into the expectations of a male-dominated industry. It’s fitting, because this show is about being unapologetically, and sometimes awkwardly, your own self.

Ms Galvo has gravitas. The show is well developed, and the arc is very well constructed, but Rachel has a stage presence and an experienced ease that does not match being so young. (How is she so young with such presence?). The thinking and the research grounding the show are also mature, and Rachel manages to take a lot of different complicated theories, explain them clearly, make them funny, and not lose the audience on the way.

These are by no means a large part of the show, but they do give it ballast. The large part of the show is accomplished and funny material about variously Montessori schooling, deficient sex education, and Jean Valjean, stories which quietly and unobtrusively demonstrate Ms Galvo’s thesis before a final powerful mic-drop. I reckon we’d have stormed some barricades if she’d asked.

Reviewed by Laura
19:00 (1 hr)
Pleasance Dome (Ace)
Until 24th