Irish comedian Grace Mulvey’s Gigantica is an hour of stand-up comedy which disarms you with its bluntness, refreshing transparency, and ultimately a sentimentality which comes as a hidden punch.
Mulvey’s humour is sharp and unpredictable, but most notably it is deeply confessional. Her honest approach to subjects of body image, family relationships, and a growing crisis of identity is urgent but not heavy-handed. Despite sometimes seeming scattered in presentation, the comedian does a wonderful job in non-chronological storytelling, as moments from her life are pieced together through delightful and candid observations. There’s a core within every hilarious anecdote and every experience becomes unwrapped as the hour goes on. Mulvey includes multiple revelations by choosing to omit details until further, and continuously coming back to things. It was incredibly satisfying to realise that the first joke was really just a set-up to the very final punchline of the set, and through her honesty, Mulvey succeeds in building real familiarity with her audience. Despite much of the humour of the show relying on its autobiographical nature, the comedian never fails to easily find common ground with the audience through her easy charisma and openness.
Mulvey’s relationship with her father is what ties the entire show together — the name Gigantica itself being a reference to her father’s specially made extra large bicycle helmet. Much like the other facts we learn about her father, this anecdote eventually spirals into existential questions and realisations. Despite speaking out of love, the comedian doesn’t sugarcoat any hard truths about the man she’s so often compared to, and who she confesses to replicate her personality after. This includes telling the audience about the tough conversations in both childhood and adulthood, including her and her dad’s political differences and difficult fall-outs. Despite this seeming heavy on paper, Mulvey strikes the perfect balance between laughter and tenderness, pushing through these sadder or more introspective moments with hard-hitting punchlines and near-perfect comedic timing.
At the start of her show, the comedian asks all the women in the room to raise their hands if like her, they’ve ever been told they look exactly like their dad — she deems this as being the furthest thing from a compliment considering not many women desire to look like the spitting image of an old man. As one of the women who raised her hand, Mulvey’s eventual revelation, in seeing the gift in looking like her father, will stick with me for a long time.
Grace Mulvey: Gigantica is running until the 30th of August at The Box at Assembly George Square. Buy Tickets here.
Image Credit — Karla Gowlett, provided to The Student by Assembly Rooms for press use
