Hannah Gadsby's Nanette and Douglas: Review

Stand up comedy is something I've loved from a very young age.

I think part of it is that I felt a bit naughty watching Live at the Apollo under the covers at midnight on a school night. There was a danger to it and there was a sense of naughtiness to the things the comedians were saying. They talked candidly about sex, awkwardness and politics and I'd never heard people talk like that before!

They weren't just funny people they were storytellers, they were activists and at the moment they were talking they held a lot of power.

Over a decade of watching shows like Mock the Week, Live at the Apollo and clips of Saturday Night Live on YouTube, I started to develop my list of favourites and would actively seek out clips of their work. For a while I was really fond of a comedian called Chris Addison although he's remembered more for his time on The Thick of It than his stand-up. Bad Education led me to Jack Whitehall and then The Office introduced me to Ricky Gervais.

Joe Lycett is still one of my favourite comedians working today. Donald Glover, although praised much more for his work as an actor, musician and writer (that man can do everything) still made one of the funniest 1 hour specials with "Weirdo" in 2012. Then through my sister I learnt about John Mulaney and the fantastic James Acaster.

And this is where my comedy starts to slip into the less mainstream. Although I still love all of these big names I always felt a bit detached from them because they were not really like me. I knew a few good female and non-gender conforming comedians through Live at the Apollo such as Zoe Lyons, Katherine Ryan and Eddie Izzard and through watching their content I got dragged in to the brilliant world of "weird" comedy. Watching clips of the up-and-coming talent. Drag acts, open mics and "fringe" comedy is where a lot of my YouTube searches end up late at night.

And that is where I first found Hannah Gadsby.

A gay, Australian, autistic stand up comedian who specialised in self-deprecating humour.

I thought she was fine, watched a few of her sets and didn't think much more about her until I went looking for stand-up shows to watch on Netflix. Her critically acclaimed Nanette came up and I just thought "why not?"

1. Nanette

Nanette is like no other stand-up show I have ever seen. I'm not even sure if I can call it stand-up. It's very funny, even hilarious at times but also a deeply personal, emotional and impassioned speech on trauma, healing, mental health, sexuality and society. Some reviews have referred to it as an anti-comedy but I'm not sure that fits it either. Nanette is a very funny show and even if you don't end the show laughing there is plenty of good comedy along the way even though it's unconventional.

Nanette is a deconstruction of comedy. It's actively exploring how a comedian works, what is happening in the performers head. What fuels self-deprecation and what effect it has on a comedians sense of self. Gadsby explains her methods, how she builds tension and when to release it. The act of editing her own life and stories to create something funny, when really her story should be told and taken seriously as a survivor of sexual abuse and mental health difficulties, things that are anything but funny.

There's a lot of anger in this show, something that could put off a lot of watchers but there's something about how raw her emotions are that elevate this from what could have sounded like a lecture to a personal plea for society to do better. A lot of people will have heard the stories she's telling before, but you won't have heard them the way she tells them. She uses the structure of comedy against itself and you feel a responsibility as a spectator to listen and understand. Never before watching a comedy special have I ever considered my own position as spectator, as audience.

The world has done this woman wrong, and as an artist she has a right to explore this across her platform and in her work. There is an element of empowerment to this show where you really do feel like it's more of a work of performative art than it is stand-up comedy.

It's a study in craft, storytelling, psychology, sociology, performance history, art history and feminism and there is simply nothing else like it. Even the way she just talks about mental health is the most honest and accurate depictions of it I've heard from somebody on TV and not in person.

It was not what I expected going in but I'm quite glad I got to feel the full emotional pull of this one. Film students will be studying this one for years to come.

2. Douglas

Nanette was supposed to be Hannah's farewell to comedy. While that might have made it even more powerful I'm incredibly happy to have Douglas. Douglas is a proof of changing times. It's a testament to survival and re-birth and after watching Nanette, it might be the pick-up you need.

More traditional stand-up than Nanette, in this show Hannah talks more openly about her late diagnosis of autism and frames the show as an exploration of how her brain works. Still heavily political and not afraid to leave tension un-resolved, Douglas is less about the speaker herself and more about the audience. She's told her story and she's still here to make us laugh. Now she can turn her eyes towards the future and how we, as a society are going to evolve.

The set I love the most in Douglas is when Hannah uses her degree in art history to tear a new one on the old renaissance painters and picasso discussing if art should be separated from the artist. A fascinating moral dilemma, explored in a very funny and entertaining way.

Although you don't need to watch Nanette to enjoy Douglas I think they work even better as a pair. While Douglas is not quite as groundbreaking as Nanette it's still good comedy and important commentary.

3. Conclusion

Hannah Gadsby's work is not for everyone. I understand that sometimes the last thing you want when watching a comedy special is to get hit in the face with how horrible the world can be for some people.

However, that makes the show itself no less important.

Women's stories have famously been censored or ignored entirely even in the modern age. There's something arresting about Gadsby's work which really brings to the forefront the shortcomings of society and how we need to, and can evolve. For years we've dismissed misogyny in comedy just because "it was only for a laugh". However when Gadsby throws it the other way she is a "bitch". Her shows show a genuine and tangible frustration. While some say she comes on too strong, she has every right to.

If she had to use comedy as a guise to be heard then so be it.

She deserves to be listened to.

Both Douglas and Nanette are on Netflix.

9/10