Harriet Kemsley: Puppy Fat

With a tilt of the head and a sideways kick of her leg, Harriet Kemsley bounds onto stage, every bit the ingénue. This high-spirited 20-something is negotiating the adult world, and, like a babe in the woods with an oversharing blog, she’s here to tell us what she’s learned.

Basically, it’s fear. Fear of being incompetent, fear of getting older, fear for young girls in a sexualised society, and fear of natural disasters, to name but a few.

Sadly, this surprisingly short show is much better at teaching the audience to fear underwhelming, humdrum shows.

Manic pixie energy only carries Kemsley so far. As each mildly diverting tale of living with actors or entering a bikini contest in Newquay is greeted with thin-lipped smiles, the initial energy leaks from the room like a slow puncture.

Her concerns—how to cope with friends getting married, what porn is doing to kids idea of relationships—are adequately articulated, but are commonplace enough to just remind you of other comedians who have tackled them with more wit and invention.

Kemsley shouldn’t fear being incompetent, nor disasters. Her show is neither. If she embraces another fear, getting older, her material may improve with age. For example, her surprisingly confessional final revelation about what her boyfriend did on a business trip to Switzerland is by far the best bit of the show.

Kemsley has the potential to swap fear for joy, but it would involve developing a healthy aversion to faux naivety and undercooked gags. Time to burn off that puppy fat.