Davina Bentley: Dancing While Old
★★★½
Davina Bentley opens her set with the fact that she is 42 and childless. Which is fine, because lots of women don’t want children and the important thing is that we support women. Which Bentley certainly does. This wry opening, which immediately situates audiences in the impossible position of wanting to date men while retaining the ability to stand against the patriarchal institution of heterosexual dating, is emblematic of Bentley’s comedy.
Over the next hour Bentley will take you on a tour of the women in her life, pausing to shout out her nieces, who call her a combination of mum and aunt — a word which will make perfect sense once you get to know her over the course of the show and find yourself experiencing a similar kinship.
Bentley proves her wit, kindness, and humour throughout her set. Speaking intimately to the audience throughout, it soon becomes clear that Bentley is someone you want to be friends with, if only to prove that you too are cool and smart and funny (a tactic Bentley explicitly tells us does not work, citing the unfunniness of her previous boyfriends).
Yet despite her natural ability to entertain, Bentley’s set seems to lack a defining narrative. She’s down to try anything — even ethical nonmonogamy — but there’s a sense Bentley’s not yet reached the end of the stories she relates and thus cannot properly secure the punchlines to her jokes.
While much of her set relies on witty one-liners, the overarching story which looms in the background of the best stand-up shows –– ready to reappear at the least opportune, and therefore funniest, moments –– feels too fragmentary here to glue the set together. And what narrative glue she does have (references to the book she was reading as a person who enjoys “much book”) feels too obviously a structural device to effectively further her humour.
When she ties down her central narrative thread, Bentley’s natural talent is sure to shine. For now, her Fringe debut leaves plenty to enjoy and the promise of better shows on the horizon.
Muna Mir
Image via Rebecca Need-Menear
