Tessa Waters: Fully Sik at Fringe Perth - Review

Post

Subscribe

Posted 2017-02-04 by Jay Crisp Crow ⇒ follow

Tue 31 Jan 2017 - Sun 05 Feb 2017

I drag my husband to some crazy events. When we met my kids were at a Steiner school and there were a lot of candlelit, softly voiced happenings whilst holding the space. God bless him, he puts up with a lot. Nowadays, he's a little more impressed with the calibre of "getting out" we do. Especially at Fringe time.

But when Tessa Waters explodes into the Gold Digger round and then completely decimates the boundary between the stage and the audience (figuratively, no stages are harmed in Tessa's show), I can feel him tense up. There's a vulnerability to Tessa's bone achingly funny comedy that's quite raw. It's certainly refreshing. It takes my British born, slightly uptight husband a moment to settle in.

But there's no time to waste - Tessa's in full flight from the first seconds.

Tessa Waters bring physical to physical comedy. There's also some seriously good clowning (Tessa studied clowning with M. Phillippe Gaulier in France - clowning teacher to the likes of Sacha Baron Cohen, Emma Thompson, and Helena Bonham Carter), and some eye-wateringly good improv.

She turns a man into a hula hoop. There's something to add to your Top 100 Things to See Before You Die list.

But what I was most impressed with, oddly, after a childhood spent in a dance studio, was Tessa's dancing. I believe Dancing Tessa may be my spirit animal.

The way she not so subtly turns parts of the show into a lesson on feminism and body positivity makes me want to whoop. Pop along to see her at Fringe before February 5th and "heck yeah!" to her 'Woman Goes To Work With Her Period' sketch.

My husband was particularly tickled by a slightly sideways interpretive dance / full-scale body party towards the end with a specific jacket that made her look like a Johnny Young Talent Time performer on speed. I think that's when he fell a bit in love with her.

She's (literally) in your face. You can't sit back and zone out. She's brash. She's brave. She's bloody beautiful.

Go see Tessa Waters go Fully Sik now until February 5th at Fringe World Festival. Tickets are here. And you can get a Tessa hit on her Facebook here.