When DeAnne Smith entered the stage dressed in an adorable ensemble, picks up her ukulele and started singing a tune that sounded like it had been lifted from the soundtrack of 500 Days of Summer I thought she must be as sweet as the title of her show suggests. Not true. Once she hits the chorus it’s clear that she may in fact be the devil in disguise. With a wicked sense of humour in this no holds barred routine Smith constantly subjects her audience to below the belt jokes and little bouts of trickery. Which is fine, if you like that sort of thing. However, when Smith is met with an audience that doesn’t, she tends to flounder a little bit.
Smith seems genuinely upset when one audience member on the front row displays signs of discomfort but this worry seems insincere when it is followed by another routine ‘trick’ on different audience member. She also described her disappointment in us as an audience - perhaps she would have preferred a raucous crowd in an underground comedy club as opposed to the Sunday evening Edinburgh clientele she was met with. Certainly a rift was driven between Smith and the audience. Nevertheless her actual material shows promise.
The set is a deconstruction of when instances in Smith’s life, which seem to be going swimmingly, quickly take a turn for the terrible. Smith explores various tales of dating, beauty treatments and trips to A&E. The set is very funny and skirts with taboos, at points going a little too far (interrogating an elderly gentleman on the front row about his internet history comes to mind). Her routine is not as ‘sunshine and rainbows’ as her publicity might suggest.