With creativity and charming self-deprecation, Ania Magliano’s Forgive Me, Father tackles questions like how to survive moving in with a partner.
With Forgive Me, Father, comedian Ania Magliano brings a fresh, cheeky energy to classic topics like the growing pains of relationships. Over a well-paced hour of long-form comedy, she weaves in topics like her complex relationship with her contraceptive coil, her parents’ divorce, social media ‘stalking,’ and her struggle to settle into cohabitation with her first live-in boyfriend. These explorations are studded with more surreal flights of fancy, as she brainstorms unusual ways to eliminate the burden of flossing and identifies her dream job in Tudor England. Ironic quips, self-deprecating stories, and light-hearted jokes are all presented with a confident, mischievous smile.
The central story of the show is Magliano’s adjustment to living with her boyfriend; he dated his last girlfriend for an intimidating eight years, while Magliano has moved through a series of short-term relationships. As they navigate life in the same home, she weighs the pros of having access to his printer against the deep defensiveness she feels at any perceived slight. She manages to convince herself that her contraceptive coil is causing this belligerence, and decides to have it removed. This coil is rapidly established as the antagonist of the story, and much of the next hour is devoted to her quest to solve her relationship problems by ridding herself of this rage-inducing contraption, all the while admitting that this blame is not based in any science other than self-assurance. While medical procedures can be an awkward subject to broach onstage, Magliano finds humour in the deep indignities of gynaecological care: imagining, for example, which outfits still work well with the bottom half completely removed. As she explores these core themes, she makes brief forays into topics like her relationship with her father, her love of gender-neutral clothing, and her fraught experience with buying an adult toy online. Each detour is carefully tied back into the narrative, and several well-timed callbacks to previous jokes give the show a truly cohesive feel; Magliano manages to deliver an intricately-constructed set while still evoking the feeling of a long phone call with a slightly chaotic friend.
With a twinkle in her eye, Magliano attempts to justify her most erratic and neurotic habits in ways which will feel familiar to most audiences. She walks the line between indulging her slightly delusional tendencies and laughing at herself along the way. After several successful solo shows at the Edinburgh Fringe and the Soho Theatre, Ania Magliano is a rising star with great promise for even more laughs to come.
Forgive Me, Father is running at the Soho Theatre Downstairs until 26 October.