Hannah Gadsby: Douglas

Though Douglas is much funnier than Nanette (and most films and series that I have seen in recent years), it similarly defies the rules of stand-up comedy in an original way and offers an ironic commentary on those rules. In addition to her comedic craft, Gadsby makes fun of anti-vaxxers, the Ninja Turtles and the patriarchy, and through an unforgettable analysis of Renaissance paintings, she also takes a shot at people who complained that Nanette was reminiscent of a lecture (Gadsby’s attitude to criticism is not the slightest bit resentful – we have plenty of specialists among male comedians for that). Her perhaps best joke, on the topic of Louis CK, perfectly punctuates her performance ___ What is most important – the inventive structure of the whole performance is broken down in great detail by the comedian during the first fifteen minutes, which gives the rest of the show a remarkable meta-dimension, because in addition to the jokes, we are amused by how they (don’t) fit into the previously presented framework (which, incidentally, is partly derived from Gadsby’s autism, which adds another level of meaning to everything). The individual segments represent various types of stand-up comedy (observational, telling jokes, presentations with pictures) and their tone differs slightly, but they are so brilliantly interwoven with numerous inside jokes (arising in the course of the performance itself) that they work flawlessly as a whole. A stand-up gem. (04.06.2020)