Fringe review: Annus Horribilis by Sharnema Nougar
The comedian turns surgical menopause into a chaotic and candid spectacle. ★★★★
She comes on stage after lurking in the shadows. A single light illuminates the face of Sharnema Nougar as she sings the opening lines of Kate Bush’s ‘Babooshka’ in a low voice. Initially, you might be confused, until that light catches at the sparkle of her eyelids and you see the fur of her coat begin to slide off her shoulders. The chosen song is suddenly a very tongue in cheek reference to what is, for so many, the scary part of baring all: the infamous bush, and everything that’s physically (and as we come to realise, mentally) hidden underneath.
A literal bare-all, chaos incarnate spectacle, Nougar roars to life in Annus Horribilis, a production documenting the confusing experience of surgical menopause. The lack of information, the medical mishandling, the weirdness and the awkwardness: it’s all here, yet with Nougar it’s suddenly not so scary.
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Nothing is left to the imagination in this riotous romp and that’s what makes it so refreshing. In a world where the body of a woman defines so much of her identity, Nougar wittily attacks the hypocrisy of such expectations, when the hormonal health of said bodies is so underrepresented. And ‘riot’ really feels like the best descriptor for what’s in store. Nougar commands the crowd with her delightfully unpredictable skit trajectories and impressions. There’s an ever-present emotional through-line, but that doesn’t mean she doesn’t have something perfectly silly up her sleeve at every turn. Advocating for ‘more science, not less’, Annus Horribilis leaves you swathed in a whirlwind of acceptance and giggles, unashamedly addressing the things we’ve long been told to never talk about.
Annus Horribilis by Sharnema Nougar is playing at The Bally at Gluttony from March 17 – 22
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