Edinburgh Fringe comedy review

Caitriona Dowden’s sophomore Fringe offering is a marginally lower-concept prospect than last year’s debut, in which she used her encyclopaedic knowledge of medieval religion to try to secure herself a sainthood.

It certainty says something about her work when a show that features her performing with a box on her head to emulate the super-devout, hermit-like anchoresses of the 13th Century is considered a step towards the mainstream.

The esoteric, low-energy comic says she aimed to make a ‘feel good show about apocalyptic dread’ this year, though the emphasis is very much on the second half of that phrase. No surprises for a girl who spread panic after sharing the fire-and-brimstone  predictions of the Book Of Revelation with her fellow Year 5s and has catastrophised ever since.

Still mining her obsession with the Middle Ages, Dowden explores the end-time fears of the first millennium coming to an end, another unusual canonisation, and the dancing plague of 1518. That latter incident inspires a personal vow to be better at being in the moment, with her incarceration in the cardboard anchorhold designed to focus her mind. The downside is that it does make observational comedy difficult.

Elsewhere, Dowden also addresses more contemporary topics such as centrist dad podcasts, an intimate medical condition that makes sex and smear tests so difficult – a rare foray into the personal – and the audiences she confused in Australia, when she went there as her prize for winning the Chortle Student Comedy Award in 2022

That the historical material is so ridiculously niche is, of course, a running joke, but she also makes the gags accessible while clever and elegant writing ties all the elements together. 

Her deadpan, near-monotone delivery is probably an acquired taste, but she is growing ever-more certain as to how to use it. And even with her guarded energy she ends on an unexpected dance, with the audience self-consciously joining in, too. It’s awkward but entertaining, much like the show that preceded it.

Review date: 7 Aug 2025
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett
Reviewed at: PBH's Free Fringe @ Carbon