Sketcherella, an outstandingly versatile performance by powerhouse Erin McGathy, is undoubtedly the highlight of Dublin Fringe Festival as the most humorous act. McGathy, a multi-talented artist excelling in singing, comedy, quick costume changes and dramatic movements during sax solo, wows the audience through her immersion in the character of Sketcherella/Dee.
The performance essentially circulates Sketcherella, a fictional persona inspired loosely by a famous Disney princess. The plot constitutes comical and blatantly sexist anecdotes from content creation spaces, sequences from storybooks, and a peculiarly human-like rat.
Set in a world similar yet distant from ours, Sketcherella/Dee navigates her life as an employee in a rodent-ridden basement of the single television network in the land, the same land that bears eerily similar cultural nuances as our own world. Sketcherella dreams of becoming a professional writer but perpetually wrestles with her narrow-minded and arrogant superiors. A highly inappropriate comedy sketch involving Alexa, jazz and murder, which derives from real-life experiences, is presented by them.
The performance of Sketcherella is a display of high-paced clever theatrical tricks. She cleverly quips, suggesting the popular TV series Game of Thrones devoid of sexual assaults. Witty punchlines abound, such as relating rats to unliked girlfriends yet remarking on their intelligence. The show doesn’t shy away from subtly pointing out the trials and tribulations women face working in the entertainment industry, igniting laughs with enjoyable text-message convos on a large screen.
The hilarity ranges from a mock musical number filled with rapid-fire jokes that make you wish for captions, to a distinct song teasing Leonardo DiCaprio’s infamous love life from his yacht’s view.
However, my preferred part is a segment involving a “dead wife acting” class, where McGathy flawlessly switches between contemplative positions and a trainer’s jargon-filled rhetoric, notably declaring, “I am not playing a woman. I am playing an idea.”
As a former member of the Upright Citizen Brigade improv assembly, and with roles in both the comedy series Community and surprisingly, the Terrence Malick film ‘Knight of Cups’, McGathy uses her extensive podcasting experience to create a humorous imitation of wellness and mindfulness applications. She utters, “My inner goddess greets your inner goddess,” in a remarkably exaggerated soft tone. However, a deluge of sponsored interruptions disrupts, introducing a startlingly unintelligent real-life crime programme and an innuendo-laden water product advertisement.
“Tickets are still available for tomorrow night,” asserts McGathy as she finished her act to applause. But truthfully, they shouldn’t be. Get yours promptly.
Her performance continues at the Smock Alley Theatre as a part of the Dublin Fringe Festival until Tuesday, 17th September.