Ania Magliano: Peach Fuzz comedy review – delightful, intelligent wit
The Saturday Night Live UK star continues her confident rise to power while tackling repression, therapy sessions and the many shapes and sizes of labia
The ‘SNL UK effect’ will be apparent across the comedy scene at this year’s Fringe, but few will reap its benefits more than Ania Magliano and Paddy Young. In the front row of Magliano’s gig, a couple wear T-shirts featuring her and Young grinning during their Weekend Update slot. Elsewhere, it’s clear that years of critically acclaimed stand-up and TV has turned her into a cottage industry of sorts: one woman in the front row strikes up a conversation about Magliano’s podcast, while a joke about her appearance on Taskmaster goes down a treat. At one point, during a vulnerable piece of confessional material, she comments, ‘I know, it’s a bit different from Saturday Night Live’ to draw a line between her telly persona and the gentle, substantial daunder of her stand-up.
Looser than some of her previous work, Peach Fuzz is broadly about Magliano coming to terms with her own body, bridging the gap between a very English repression and a desire to unshackle herself from sexual hang-ups. Her conversational flow (which places her somewhere between the stuttering unsurety of Richard Curtis-era Hugh Grant and a Simon Amstell-ish sense of self-reflection) continues to hold the verve of a friend in the room. As she guides her audience through recent encounters with therapists, floatation tanks and a very labia-focused body positivity, unexpected and delightful punchlines are where she shines. If any SNL UK fans were puzzled by the lack of Weekend Update-style zingers, it didn’t show. Magliano, as ever, courts a warm reception.
Ania Magliano: Peach Fuzz, Monkey Barrel, until 30 August, 1.25pm.