I first saw Australian comedian Alice Fraser’s show Savage five years ago, in a noisy pub on Edinburgh’s Cowgate, where its combination of philosophical comedy and private trauma refused to take flight. Five years on, Amazon Prime has put wind beneath its wings as part of its bid to muscle in on the standup special market. Much improved since its fringe appearance, Savage may still be too self-conscious and self-serious for some comedy fans. “I don’t think there’s enough room in civilised society for sadness anymore,” argues Fraser, whose show is certainly bigger on poignancy than good cheer. The filmed version cuts to audience members who are in tears.
The show’s ostensible subject is the death of Fraser’s mother, a musician with multiple sclerosis, after decades’ of illness. There are audio clips of Fraser interviewing her mum. But although she warns us at the beginning to expect tragedy, she doesn’t fully address it until the final third. For the most part, her show circles around ideas of faith, carpe diem, and how “only the unfinished can contain the infinite, right?” There are more tenuous ruminations where that comes from, as Fraser tells us how “art is a great way to turn pain into beauty”, and marvels at the innocent pleasures of infancy. “How good was it to be a baby? ... Do you remember how amazing it was?”
It can all start to resemble the Ted Talk Fraser once delivered, as recounted in one set-piece here. The show withholds catharsis and ends in solemnity. Humour feels like a means of shepherding us towards the life lessons, rather than Fraser’s instinctive response to the world. But it does that job well: Savage is nothing if not artfully constructed. And there are adroit comic manoeuvres, as she navigates from happy funerals to anal bleaching, advances her no-nonsense take on female body image issues or depicts her horror at having to follow an inspirational burns victim on to the Ted stage. With that routine, as often elsewhere, the audience’s laughter sounds very much like relief that Fraser has broken one more portentous silence with a smile.
