So this could be awkward: Bridget Christie is a woman and a feminist. We know this because she tells us, repeatedly. I’m a male journalist – and a target for a reasonable chunk of her material.
The most important thing, though, is that Christie is funny. She deservedly gets big laughs from the packed-out Norwich Playhouse as she delivers her two latest shows, A Bic For Her and Ungrateful Woman.
The first focuses on the bizarre decision to design a biro specifically for women, the second largely on the absurdist world of Müller yoghurt commercials. These both give rich pickings, but at times she resembles Stewart Lee at his most testing: minutely dissecting and dissembling on a topic beyond its comic worth.
There are astute routines on the lack of female snooker players, concepts of body image, and Cadbury’s Caramel adverts. Other jokes – like those about Margaret Thatcher and the Spice Girls – are less inspired.
Christie seems desperate to be seen as a firebrand at constant risk of upsetting her audience when, at least to the liberal Playhouse crowd, she is preaching the new orthodoxy.
She has good jokes and a likeable on-stage presence, but she needs some sharper editing and stronger narratives to really hammer home both her humour and her politics.
