If fringe audiences know Frankie McNair’s work at all, it’s as a purveyor of vaporously insubstantial nonsense-comedy – see her 2023 show Relax Your Knees, which made a brief London visit. So it’s quite the pivot to Huge Ass Mindset, nominated for best show at the Melbourne comedy festival, which addresses the least frivolous topic possible: child sexual abuse. That’s no spoiler. While trauma-comedy convention would require McNair to withhold that bombshell until 20 minutes from the end, she makes it known – expansively, with heartfelt content warnings and astringent punchlines attached – from the get-go.
For some time, McNair’s show toggles between material on her experience, and a commentary on how shocking she acknowledges that material to be. But it’s an urgent matter for the Canberra native, not only because (according to recent research) one in four Australians experience child sexual abuse, but because of a recent incident that brought her face to face with her abuser in the most extraordinary circumstances. That’s a jaw-dropping story to tell, and she has the warmth, high-strung charisma and craft to tell it – and to sell it, just about, as comedy. And as for the confidence? The show’s title describes the brand of bravado McNair has been cultivating to mend her self-esteem and make this story fearlessly her own.
As that implies, this is a show with a fair quotient of therapy-speak, and the expectation that, laughing aside, we’re here to celebrate our host’s “amazing growth”, thanks in part to the support of her comedy community. Only the stoniest-hearted could fail to do so after an hour in which she has rendered the most fragile stuff of her life into uproarious, on-the-edge performance – see the gags about suicidal ideation, or the one about her response to the question “what does your dad do?” (A mid-show detour into kooky character-comedy, presumably inserted for light relief, feels teleported in from an entirely different show.) Ten years after Richard Gadd won the Edinburgh comedy award, Huge Ass Mindset demonstrates the enduring – and healing – potency of laughs recovered from the worst places imaginable.
• At Gilded Balloon Teviot, Edinburgh, until 30 August
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• In the UK, the NSPCC offers support to children on 0800 1111, and adults concerned about a child on 0808 800 5000. The National Association for People Abused in Childhood (Napac) offers support for adult survivors on 0808 801 0331. In the US, call or text the Childhelp abuse hotline on 800-422-4453. In Australia, children, young adults, parents and teachers can contact the Kids Helpline on 1800 55 1800; adult survivors can seek help at Blue Knot Foundation on 1300 657 380. Other sources of help can be found at Child Helpline International
