Saturday, August 2, 2014

Fringe Festival: "Natural Novice"

Day: 2

Show: 6


Category: Comedy


Written by: Siobhan O'Loughlin

Location: HUGE Theater

Summary: A one-woman show about one woman's journey to become comfortable with and confident in her decision not to shave.

Highlights: Siobhan is completely charming and disarming, somehow not at all what I expected from this piece about body hair. Which just goes to show that our attitudes towards and stereotypes about women's body hair are deeply ingrained (no pun intended) in our culture. Siobhan spent some time in a commune in Vermont, and inspired by the beautiful, confident, hairy women she met, decided not to shave, a decision she struggled with when she returned to Brooklyn. She interviewed a half dozen of her friends about the topic, and portrays them as well as telling her own story. Each of these women has had a different experience with shaving, which together form a portrait of what it means to grow up in this society with so many expectations about what it means to be a woman and what you have to do to be accepted as a woman. But don't be scared, it's also a very funny and accessible show, something every woman can relate to. You will leave this show thinking a little differently about women's body hair, which is of course about so much more than hair.