Mae Martin: Us

★★★
comedy review (edinburgh) | Read in About 2 minutes
33329 large
115270 original
Published 15 Aug 2015

Delightful, small and chirpy, Canadian comic Mae Martin has some things to say about all of us, but mainly about herself.

Martin looks like a teenager, but she's not short on life experience and her open-minded upbringing has led her to an interesting world view. She doesn’t like labels, specifically about gender and sexuality. Rather than identifying as gay, straight or bi she prefers to fall in love with whom she falls in love with and let the rest work itself out. It's hard to argue with such a candid approach.

She goes onto to tell charming anecdotes about herself. Her upbringing, family, time spent at summer camp. It's all wholesome stuff. Her observation on the trend of abbreviating words is excellent and definitely one for the younger generation. Also her account of a story told by a family friend about a certain celebrity is absolutely brilliant and right on theme (I won't spoil it here). She only goes off topic when there's no other alternative and deals with hecklers in a fantastically friendly way, never putting anyone down but making light of it and having fun.

This show sees some great material spread just a little too thinly across the hour. And by the end the incessant, and slightly preachy, "can we all just be ourselves" bit has lost its edge and the whole thing begins to feel like an LGBT rally with jokes, rather than a standup set. It's a shame because Martin is a comic with a lot to offer.