Jessie Nixon: Don’t Make Me Regret This comedy review – Spiky yet vulnerable
A strong showcase for this charismatic mind, railing against those who have wronged her
Jessie Nixon has the stage presence of a lit firework. Manifestly bright and to be regarded warily given that hurt people can hurt people, but with the promise of greater things to come. Straight-talking in intent yet sardonic in execution, spiky but with a freely displayed vulnerability, she often simmers with scarcely concealed anger yet retains a sly playfulness. Through pained confessional, non-sequitur whimsy and flinty social commentary, scarifying in its assessment of men, the Bristolian has a varied stand-up repertoire. Supplementing it with some dryly pithy poetry and a country music hoedown inspired by the persistence of an unsuitable Texan suitor, her delivery runs slightly slower than stream-of-consciousness, breathless as it’s transmitted.
Nixon’s landlord suggests that she has rampant egomania but a crippling lack of self-esteem, a potent cocktail for a comic as she acknowledges. And nothing in Don’t Make Me Regret This disabuses you of that analysis. She has some maternal issues and persistent feelings of persecution about her body, after snippy former colleagues and the wonders of modern technology force her to focus on her weight. But these aggravations pale in comparison to the dirty she’s been done by men.
Perceptive on the hypocrisies underlying sexual attraction, admitting her guilt in this manner, she’s elsewhere unsparing in her denunciation of male lust, clinically and articulately furious about the catcalling, rape and paedophile culture that's trickled down from the Epstein-adjacent elites at the summit of society. There are times when Nixon might sustain her artfulness for longer but she’s funny whether forging connections or deliberately discomfiting. And if this breakthrough show is a little disjointed, it’s nevertheless a compelling showcase of her charismatic, unsettled mind.
Jessie Nixon: Don’t Make Me Regret This reviewed at Gael & Grain, as part of Glasgow International Comedy Festival.