Chelsea Birkby brings her latest Edinburgh Fringe show ‘Chelsea Birkby: Is In Full Control The Entire Time’ to Bunker 3 at Pleasance Courtyard. Dressed in an over-sized 1980s suit, she is here to tell us how to gain control over our lives, with the help of Powerpoint, an alter ego, and her mum’s self-improvement workbooks.
She’s giggly and fun, with the relaxed presence onstage that only time can teach, and a dab hand at crowdwork. She takes us through some self-help books that didn’t make the cut – Sun Tzu’s The Art of War among them – and takes time to do the Lord’s work (educating an American on what ‘munter’ means.) There’s some great bits about her quest for visible abs, and she takes us through Reddit’s opinion on her progress, which is fun; she’s not afraid to go the extra mile for material, and the audience love her anecdotes, Photoshop attempts and Powerpoint gags. Her self-actualisation journey also takes in potential parenthood and her health struggles, but remains assuredly silly and energetic. It veered too much towards the former to nail the emotional peak for me, but Birkby is a pro with comedy baked in.
Chelsea Birkby: Is In Full Control The Entire Time is on at Bunker 3 at Pleasance Courtyard until August 30th