Catie Wilkins – Original Review
Note: This review is from 2009
Review by Steve Bennett
Dry-as-dust newcomer Catie Wilkins exudes a miserable, detached ennui that is unlikely to fire up many crowds – but look beyond the low-energy deadpan, and you’ll see some funny ideas at work.She’s aiming for a sort of elegant filth, applying Stewart Lee-like disdain and deconstruction to a set that revolves largely around sex. It can fall between two stools, most likely disappointing those wanting raucous filth, though her deliciously sick opening gag about talking dirty sets the tone.
All the anecdotes are told with slow deliberation, taking, for example, a sadly all-too common run-in with a feisty woman in the street as a step-by-step anecdote with wry commentary at each line. Don’t feel too short-changed that the tale has no satisfactory conclusion, as it rather suits Wilkins’s postmodern approach.
A little over a year into her comedy career, she’s a fair way from being a finished product at the moment; every laugh isn’t guaranteed and she struggles to engage with the audience through that detachment, but there’s certainly a fertile imagination in the writing, with a keen grasp of how to express it.
Review date: 6 May 2009
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett
