I Want to Speak to Your Manager (How I Was Radicalised and Became ... Karen)
Pearse Centre, Dublin 2
★★★☆☆
Holly Hughes is attempting to tie a complex knot. I Want to Speak to Your Manager finds her onstage persona facing up to transition from habitual people pleaser to the sort of person who draws infinite pleasure in finding fault with a perfectly tolerable plate of monkfish.
The show admits there is a liberation in becoming the “Karen” of vernacular abhorrence. Why should you tolerate a Pinot Grigio less dry than requested? Why indeed? As “Holly” explains, to be frictionless is to be malleable.
All well and good. The tension between the doormat tendency and early midlife narcissism provides the basis for genial comedy over a tidy running time. It is only in the closing moments that the show’s reach exceeds its grasp.
Before that we get an overdue treatise on, if I’m reading this right, the too-common delusion that a visit to Australia is essential for completing the Irish millennial personality. She talks about Gen Z Aussie barmen pulling Guinness wrongly. She pontificates on low-level fascist harassment on the train after not quite putting her feet on the seat.
Pea Dinneen: Raising Her Voice, at Dublin Fringe, is a fantastically stirring cabaret about a trans life forced on hold
Can becoming a ‘Karen’ be liberating, I Want to Speak to Your Manager asks, at Dublin Fringe
Good With Faces, Oisín Kearney’s new two hander at Dublin Fringe, is filled with punchy twists
Clash at the Quays! II: Lokomania, at Dublin Fringe, is sweaty, sexy and mischievous
Nobody else from the old country has ever made the trip. Only Holly is in a position to compare the two nations. You know the sort of thing. It’s all fun stuff (and necessary satire).
Eventually wrapped in a white North Face gilet, Hughes does a decent job of balancing affection and abhorrence for her creation. She correctly points out that, as the patriarchy values assertiveness in itself, there is no male equivalent for “Karen”.
Alas, the closing attempt to reclaim the term for feminism feels like a stretch. Arguing for a Karen who complains only on behalf of others is akin to arguing for a bully who punches only upwards. Selfishness is baked into the slur.
Nonetheless, a diverting monologue from a sparky, engaging talent.
Continues at Pearse Centre, Dublin 2 as part of Dublin Fringe Festival, until Sunday, September 14th
