Written for The List
Ah, the quarterlife crisis; a life-slump suffered by 20-something Generation Y-ers with big dreams, little direction and zero financial security. With the big three-oh looming, Sophie Willan, Léonie Higgins and Lowri Evans explore its grip in three autobiographical monologues -- all still embryonic scratches -- that tend towards observational comedy.
Actually, the theme fades in and out of view. Popstar-in-waiting Higgins sashays from the frustrations of the permanent temp to the music industry’s in-built misogyny. Willan runs us through various older women in her life: her grandmother, newly into txtspk; her landlady Audrey, with her Ben Stiller lookalike dog. Dishing out pillbox hats, she attempts to shape us into a crack-team of grannies. Neither get far beyond cliché.
Evans’ piece shows more potential. The most theatrically-minded, she hands out photos of selves constructed in the changing rooms of TK Maxx: blushing newlyweds, high-flying execs and mothers-of-two. Gentle scorn is reserved for the unrealistic ideal lifestyles pedalled by consumerism in Gwyneth Paltrow’s cookbook and lingerie adverts. Reality, Evans shows, is rather harder and, though she meanders distractedly, there are seeds of interest here.
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