EDINBURGH 2023: Review: RUBY MCCOLLISTER: TRAGEDY at Underbelly, Cowgate

Now, if you've been to the Edinburgh Fringe before then you know there is no shortage of either odd shows or odd performers out there. This year, Ruby McCollister sticks out as one of oddest. Granted, she's no Betty Grumble or Jellybean Martinez but her latest show Tragedy is one that is best described as eccentric.

Focusing on her upbringing in the most tragic city to ever exist, Los Angeles, Ruby talks (and dances and writhes and shakes) us through her obsession with tragedy and how tragic women like Marilyn Monroe, Karen Carpenter and Barbara Payton have shaped her life.

Guiding us through her life, McCollister takes us to where it all began; her Father's theatre. A cooky little place that produced stage plays such as an adaptation of a lesser known Philip K. Dick novel Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said, or for vanity projects of old soap opera stars. It was here that Ruby's love of performing started, where she saw her first ghost and where her obsession with tragedy began. 

Ruby doesn't just tell us these stories or funny little anecdotes though, she sings them, screams them and sometimes she does a little bit of both. Essentially, any form of delivery that could be considered abnormal is exactly how Ruby McCollister decides to perform. It can take some getting used to - perhaps you never will get used to it - with the performer intermittently switching things up with some audience participation in which you're never really sure if she actually wants you to take part; sometimes pulling the mic away and continuing her act before you even get the chance to respond to her prompt, and sometimes leaving the mic in front of you for an awkward amount of time before you realise she actually wants to hear what you say.

It creates an interesting dynamic between the audience and performer where the crowd never really knows how to respond other than by sheer gut instinct. Rather than wait for others to laugh or to cheer, they do so by their own individual impulse. This can cause the occasional awkward moment where you are the only one to react (no one else cheered for the Rudolph Valentino shout out) and you must sit in your own awkward silence afterward but it ultimately creates an atmosphere that feels interesting, unique and you can't help but love sitting in it.

Just as McCollister's own sporadic impulses mean that we never know what she is going to do next, nor do we know how the audience will react to it. You can't help but get wrapped up in it.

For as eccentric and macabre the show may be, it is just as weird and wonderful. A show that keeps us on our toes and that is a sheer joy to be a part of. McCollister's brand of humour and stage presence simply won't be for everyone, she is most certainly an acquired taste, but for the right audience Ruby McCollister: Tragedy is an excellent show that will linger on the mind for the rest of the year.

Ruby McCollister: Tragedy runs at Underbelly Cowgate until 27 August.

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