Isabel Renner’s Wyld Woman: The Legend of Shy Girl, a one-woman show about Shy Girl, who has never really had a friend. We meet her as she’s preparing a dinner party for a group of Legends that she is probably becoming friends with. Shy Girl takes us, her imaginary friends, through all of the events that led us to this moment.
Obviously created in a post-Broad City New York, Wyld Woman is steeped in the #awkward comedies that made every girl in 2015 buy an army jacket and want to move to Brooklyn.
Every audience member is given a name tag, on which to write their name in block capitals. This is a fun breaking of the fourth wall, and gives Renner a sort of sounding board for Shy Girl’s never-ending monologue. If you’re very lucky or visibly Legendary (which I was), you might even be brought up on stage to enjoy the show as one of Shy Girl’s imaginary friends. My unique vantage point allowed me to see the audience as well as Renner, which was a real treat and reaffirmed my inability to ever do theatre in front of a group of strangers.
Renner’s writing is sharp and clear, which is no mean feat considering that she plays half a dozen distinctly different people throughout the show. Her ability to switch into different voices and mannerisms on a dime is impressive, and keeps the show moving swiftly the whole time.
Shy Girl talks us through familiar struggles: being friends with your roommate, going to therapy, convincing yourself you have vaginismus, and having crushes on ugly men just because you both work in a restaurant together. I think the ending, where we are introduced to a new “real” character, falls slightly flat. I would have liked the ending to be a bit less “happily ever after,” because the attempted character development felt a bit rushed and unnecessary.
Overall, Wyld Woman avoids the traditional one woman show trap, it is not self-indulgent or preachy. It is a fun hour of theatre that goes by extremely quickly, even when you’re wearing a party hat on stage, acutely aware that you didn’t put any mascara on this morning.
Wyld Woman: The Legend of Shy Girl is on at 16:00 in Assembly George Street’s Drawing Room, until 25 August.
Buy tickets here.
Image provided to The Student for press use