EDINBURGH 2026: Review: JESS FUCHS: FERAL, Bunker Two At Pleasance Courtyard

From the Zara Larsson tunes blasting as we walk in, and Jess Fuchs emerging in thigh-highs and a cloud of black tulle, it’s clear the Australian comic is intent on taking Edinburgh crowds on the best girls’ night out of their lives.

That tone continues in Fuchs’ opening gambits, which she describes as “chatting sh*t about my family and friends”. Her character on stage is larger than life, taking us down rabbit holes about ghosting, bra fittings, awkward hairdresser appointments, and everything else that would be dissected to exhaustion in the girls’ group chat. There’s also a natural playfulness to Fuchs’ crowdwork, with chatty tangents about niche Australian true crime stories, just as though we were talking to her in a club bathroom.

As Fuchs starts to find her rhythm, the probing of womanhood touches on more difficult topics. The comic is candid about the societal backlash she’s received as a childfree woman, and nuanced in her approach to discourse around gender roles and sexual consent.

Another recurring theme concerns how plus-size people (she adamantly uses the word ‘fat’) are treated by medical professionals. By the end of one humiliating encounter with a doctor, Fuchs is considering bringing back medieval leeching. She herself approaches her body with radical neutrality, even using it as a source of physical comedy in an extended bit exploring suicide ideation.

The only downside to this character, most of the time so confident, even when delving into her insecurities, is how quick she is to put down her own intelligence, and that of other women. There are a few too many ‘jokes’ about women not needing to think too hard, not wanting to work demanding jobs, and not knowing what the ‘E’ and ‘M’ in STEM stand for. Fuchs lampoons her mother for badgering her to get a boyfriend, but employs some of the same tropes of single female incompetence herself.

She wins me over, though, with the climax of her set, involving a trip to the Cliffs of Moher in Ireland, a broken coccyx, and a graphic X-ray snapshot to prove she lived to tell the tale. There have been vignettes about the trip to Ireland throughout – a lot of fun is had with mispronouncing the name ‘Siobhan’ – but the injury is where the entire show really comes together. In one fell swoop, Fuchs has managed to unite her observations on friendship, dating and healthcare, under the banner of one endlessly silly injury.

Come to Jess Fuchs for a boozy, gossipy night out, but stay for a deceptively elegant comedic structure.

Jess Fuchs: Feral plays at Bunker Two at Pleasance Courtyard until 30 August

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