Pleasance Courtyard’s Beneath has some, but not all, of the atmosphere of Alan Cumming’s club, where Catherine Cohen performs regularly. But with high octane energy and an equally flammable shimmer curtain backdrop, Cohen’s brand of New York cabaret meets millennial mania comes to Edinburgh for one month only.
The songs punctuate an otherwise loosely-held but nevertheless hilarious string of observations built around the demands of being a twenty- or thirty-something city-dweller in 2019. Deconstructing as she goes along, Cohen is a master vocalist, and shares a great rapport with her keyboardist Henry Koperski. The songs are comfortably in the cabaret-style, but with seething lyrics about revenge on leery men, tiny clothes shop sizes, and what lead her to do comedy in the first place (a clue: boys).
It is hard to trace which reserve Cohen’s frenetic energy draws from. The precarity of millennial life is captured in one song about Events in which she reminds us not to send invitations by mail as she is forced to move often, unable to afford rent. But more often, the neuroses come from the exhaustion to never-not turn out gorgeous, and be ready to produce content at a moment’s notice.
An interlude, or ‘top-bun moment’, offers a caustic poetry performance that trumps Tim Key, and skewers the likes of Rupi Kaur in the process. And as the show’s title implies, Cohen does eventually come round to acknowledge that of course, she is not only great looking, but also an artistic genius. Perhaps the real problem for millennials is that they’re just too self-aware.
Catherine Cohen, The Twist...? She's Gorgeous, Pleasance Courtyard until August 25. Tickets here.
