Review: Helen Duff – How Deep Is Your Duff

★★★
comedy review (edinburgh) | Read in About 2 minutes
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Published 11 Aug 2018
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If you're really jazzed about replacing lines in pop songs with the word "Duff" in an incongruous male monotone, the good news is you've come to the right place. The female anatomy (and undetermined depth thereof) features heavily in an expressive, entertainingly weird hour from Helen Duff. 

The show itself, taking the form of a one-woman dramatic monologue in parts, exists almost as a satire of the pressure on female comics to promote a message with their art. Duff celebrates femininity for sure, but draws back a little when it comes to packaging it in any sincere form. She's just having fun with it, a ball of kooky energy with a penchant for the theatrical. It's briefly meta, but without the associated "phor".

The show extols female empowerment in whichever form the audience chooses to infer. Duff's own mountain to climb has been one of sexual frustration, and we're treated (or punished) with an unfiltered account of her journey to achieve orgasm. As a storyteller she doesn't elicit many big laughs, but she's endearingly hyper, which just about keeps things ticking over. 

She's like a runaway-train, descending into stuttering gibberish if the mood takes her and even pulling some convincing mime out the bag – watch out for her particularly inventive gesturing. You'll find funnier shows this Fringe, but you're unlikely to find a more candid account of embarrassing oneself in the pursuit of love.