Tiff Stevenson: Bombshell

Tiff Stevenson's show is unabashed in its engagment with party politics. She derides Trump, May and Brexit in ways that are unlikely to be rejected by Fringe audiences. But she also attacks the left, and her primary topic is how identity politics has come to dominate the progressive agenda to such an extent that fear of offence has become a debilitating restraint. She rails against those who assert authority because of some aspect of their selves, returning repeatedly to mothers who believe that having offpsring is a trump card in any argument. The audience responds with recognition, and it's heartening to encoutner a performer using comedy for political ends.

But it's a shame then that the complexities of those politics are not always comically explored to their fullest. She asserts an authority to speak about the Grenfell Tower fire as a lifelong resident of the area, and while the exhortation she makes for society to serve the poor better is well put, it doesn't have any jokes in it. And in her derision of some members of society she engages in the kind of comic silencing that she sees as the very problem with identity politics. There's a final section where she reflects on her own unconscious prejudices where everything comes alive, for here the contradictions that exist within the liberal mindset are presented in their comic absurdity. More of that kind of stuff—to which some of the audience did not how to respond—is the kind of thing that comedy uniquely can add to political debate.