Kaitlyn Rogers: laboured randomness

There’s always a large pool of whacky comedy acts at the Edinburgh Fringe. Among them this year is Australian comedienne Kaitlyn Rogers. Her debut late night set, Can I Get An Amen?!, mixes silliness with a dose of millennial hipster shtick, like quoting ‘great’ (as in obviously bad) movies like Sister Act 2 and Space Jam and insisting Beyoncé is the greatest thing to ever happen to the human race. For the duration, she wears glitter makeup and a leopard-print jumpsuit.

The through-line of the show comes from her obsession with Whoopi Goldberg and the mystical art of ‘sass’. Her set is so driven by ‘randomness’ it’s rather remarkable when she does land on some genuinely edgy material, like going on a date with her brother after matching with him on Tinder or having sex with a 12-year-old in a cinema out of loneliness. But these appear more as her playing the fool than grasping at some thematic substance. After all, the Fringe website describes the show as a ‘clown’ piece.

Rogers is charismatic to the point of being overwhelming, with a gloriously heavy Aussie accent and an extraordinary control of her body. Unfortunately, sheer exuberance can’t make up for how detached and laboured this show is.

Christian Butler is a spiked columnist. Follow him on Twitter: @CPAButler

Can I Get An Amen?! is at the Gilded Balloon Teviot until 28 August.