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Sarah Kendall, comedy review: Audiences will be hooked by Kendall's tales

Storyteller: Sarah Kendall remains extremely funny and extremely haunting: Alamy Images
Storyteller: Sarah Kendall remains extremely funny and extremely haunting: Alamy Images

Comedians tend to find their voice and stick to it. Sarah Kendall found her voice a decade ago, enjoyed success and recently changed it, switching from gag-heavy stand-up to storyteller. Her latest show is one long tale. Comedy fans need not rush for the exit though. She is still extremely funny as well as extremely haunting.

Shaken takes us back to Kendall’s youth in smalltown Australia where she was a lonely nerd. Because of her pale complexion she had to stay indoors on sunny days and watch her friends playing through the window, “pressing against the glass like a dead Victorian child.”

Perhaps it was feeling like an outsider that prompted the teenager to develop a vivid imagination and one day invent a reason for being late for school that soon had the whole town gripped. A simple untruth soon spiralled. She was popular at last, albeit with consequences…

Kendall delivers her account using techniques honed on the club circuit. Misdirection, motifs and callbacks carry the audience along. Storytelling is clearly different to stand-up yet Kendall highlights the similarities as much as the contrasts. But is her recollection true or is she taking a shaggy dog for a walk? In the end this is irrelevant. You’ll be hooked either way. And if you cannot get to Soho it airs on Radio 4 on Tuesday.

Until Tuesday, Soho Theatre; sohotheatre.com; Sarah Kendall: Australian Trilogy — Shaken, Radio 4, tomorrow, 11pm