An electrifying work in progress show proving Maria Telnikoff is one to watch
Sometimes, Maria Telnikoff wishes she could lean in to the frequent comparisons of female writers to Phoebe Waller-Bridge and simply call her own show Lice-bag. Or, to have the privilege of being a man and hailed as an eternal great like Homer for being bold enough to write about sex. Billed as “part stand-up, part poetry, part interpretive dance,” and absolutely nailing all three of these promises, this work in progress show tracks Telnikoff’s quest to write The Great Female Novel. And it’s fantastic.
It’s not easy to review a work in progress show as one would a finished product. That being said, there are some things it’s easy to say. Firstly, Telnikoff is a magnetic performer. She struts the stage with surprising ease, has brilliant comic timing, and holds the audience in the palm of her hand throughout all sixty minutes of chaos. Her switches between moments of comedy and vulnerability are sudden yet believable and only add to the impact of both. In other moments, the shift is slower and we watch on the edge of our seats as something that was initially funny grows in sadness over time. It’s excellent, and Telnikoff’s ability as a performer leaves us wanting more.
The second thing to say is that Telnikoff is an incredibly talented writer. She is relatable and hilarious in her stand-up-style anecdotes, sound in her structural understanding of what makes a compelling story, and is never too far from a surprisingly original simile to capture the moment. For me, her writing ability is best displayed in her poetry where she tightropes the line between humour and heartbreaking poignancy with a simplicity Blake would appreciate. (Her poetry collection is called songs of inexperience in reference to Blake’s Songs of Innocence and of Experience).
If there’s something the show is missing then it’s probably a tightening of the screws. When watching the piece, I couldn’t help feel there was a stronger thread at its centre struggling to be seen—a gravitational force that wanted to pull each disparate element closer together. The structure of the show overall is a nice idea: a journey through each chapter of the book, each chapter of Telnikoff’s journey. The rhythm is solid, and some of the choices are superb; I particularly enjoyed Telnikoff’s choice to skip over Chapter Four in order to preserve her own heart since this is where we would find her first love. However, where the show succeeds in telling its stories, it lacks in the power of its narrative. Moments that seem to demand callbacks are overlooked, the weight of the overarching objective of writing the novel is sometimes lost, and the most affecting depths of the character’s heart are left unsatisfyingly unplumbed.
The main reason these points take something away from the show is because Telnikoff’s potential is clear to see. Whether it’s her Notes app poetry or corporeal mime, her Stetson-wearing dancing or her stand-up adlibs, her Gadsby-esque musings on the line between fiction and experience or her pin-point skewering of those types of men we all know well (or perhaps, fear we occasionally are)… we yearn for more. It’s a testament to her talent, and I can’t wait to see where this show—and this writer—go from here.
Maria Telnikoff’s My Dad Wears a Dress, a one woman show about growing up with a transgender parent, heads to the Underbelly in Edinburgh this year. Tickets are available now.