Tuesday, 9 April 2024

Sunny Side Up review (Melbourne International Comedy Festival)

After breaking up with her boyfriend, Diana Nguyen decided to go for a walk to clear her head. Sounds reasonable. Except Diana took it a step further and walked 300kms of the Camino De Santiago in Spain. In her stand-up show Sunny Side Up, Nguyen explores existential questions around what happens after a break-up that results in a number of unexpected surprises, for her and her audience.

Nguyen initially appears playfully timid, but as she quickly tells us, this fairy tale of love ended up being a teary tale and we then see the unabashed, loud, and snorting version of the comedian. We are taken through a variety of episodes in the lead up to her trip to Spain and the other adventures that follow, including a ridiculous story of an Italian man and a yacht that feels like it has been plucked straight out of the second season of The White Lotus, but with a comparatively much better ending for Nguyen.


We take a detour during the second half with Nguyen revealing her decision to freeze her eggs and become a mother. While she doesn’t open up too much about this in the show, she shares enough that we can understand her reasons for doing this and empathise with her situation.

Nguyen also finally gets to put her drama degree to good use with some entertaining performances as a Vietnamese woman selling delicious fertilised duck eggs, as well as a moment where she represents how one word – no spoilers - can conjure up extremely different images and meanings from two people.

A song is performed at the end of Sunny Side Up and you wonder why Nguyen has created this show with only one song! She has a fantastic voice and would have been great to hear more of that. Regardless, Sunny Side Up is a delightful journey through heartbreak and coming out of the end of it filled with more love and hope than you thought you were capable of.

SHOW DETAILS

Venue: Melbourne Town Hall, 100 Swanston St, Melbourne
Season:
 until 21 April | Tues - Sat 6:20pm, Sun 5:20pm
Duration:
 50 minutes
Tickets:
 $32 - $35 Full | $30 Conc | $28 Tightarse Tuesday
Bookings:
 Melbourne International Comedy Festival

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