Edinburgh Fringe 2026
#Hysterical
Panad Productions
Genre: character comedy, Comedy
Venue: The space on the Mile
Festival: Edinburgh Fringe
Low Down
This is a one-woman, three-character performance piece as Callaghan takes us on a journey from Victorian times to modern day. They play a female Victorian educator and the Lord of the Manor to take us through their prejudices of sexuality and gender. This is juxtaposed with the hangover of how we have ended up with similar points of view along the way.
Review
This is funny and educational in equal measure. When we discover, towards the end, that Callaghan has, after two decades of working as an educationalist, found herself out in the cold due to her creative career, both the educationalist and creative in me died a little. It is clear how effective an educator she is, I know, because I am also an educationalist.
The writing cleverly juxtaposes morality neatly packaged now and the origin of much nonsense. There are points when Callaghan interjects using a form of superwoman style spectacles that remove the disguise ironically in reverse to give us her commentary and opinion. There are plenty of warnings that the two characters we have been listening to are indeed that, characters. Satire as well clearly as irony, is alive and well.
This has clearly got an educational influence – the title refers to the old wandering womb phenomenon which, like much of Victoriana was more myth than anything else – as the tech being used suggests, though at times it let her down, it does manage to give us a visual aid that works well, when it works! However, the fact it didn’t, was unable to bamboozle our guide who smooched through.
The move between the characters works well, the two characters being portrayed are not to be taken overly seriously – except for realising the absurdity of the things that they are saying.
I mused about the trigger warnings, not for the themes being explored but to remind us that the characters may stray into something worthy of an apology and they are not to be taken as a serious interpretation of the performer and what they believe. It is quite clear that the satirical take upon the Victorian sexuality and gender here is so obvious that it would take a complete clown to miss it. It is funny, it is poised, it is poignant, it is structurally well put together.
Callaghan is an engaging performer and knows how to work with their audience. They manage to keep us both entertained and engaged, whilst at the same time some of the things that are being talked about are slightly embarrassing for those of a certain age. Once they get those of a certain age up on stage to embarrass them thoroughly, that embarrassment is done with a great deal of consent being requested, it mellows out.
Technically, on the night I saw it, there were a few little gripes and gremlins, however you got the idea. It would be churlish to be overly critical of what had broken down. The more important elements that got broken down were the nonsensical views exposed, if you pardon the pun. Even if you don’t, Victorian moralists, as Robert Louis Stevenson and Jekyll and Hyde showed, were the good guy during the day and the devil at night. That there are people who want to make somewhere great again and deny the right of people to be, is not unfortunate, it’s part tragedy. Things like this remind us of where those daft notions originated and should be kept.
Developed with the support of Soho Theatre Labs I was delighted to get the opportunity to see this because I think Soho does a fantastic job in developing and encouraging new writing.
It is exactly the type of theatre that should be here where it is on the edge and cutting through though it needs a few more people to fill the space.
