Writer and performer: Katherine Haywood
‘Didn’t get me a boyfriend,’ Katherine Haywood reflects ruefully of her 2023 show, Yoga and Sex for Women (over 40). The truth is that Yoga and Sex was absolutely hilarious, so her new piece, Magic & Sex, currently playing as part of the Camden Fringe Festival, has a lot to live up to.
The premise is engagingly risky. Haywood claims to have cobbled together Magic & Sex with her mate Barb; she, Haywood, taking care of the magic tricks – she’s been learning for, oh, 10 days, at least – and Barb is to supply the sex bit. But Barb is a no-show. We later hear that she has told Haywood she’s rubbish at magic. So what we get is Haywood alternating between moments of self-assurance and wobbly doubt. How’s she going to fill up the time? she wonders on several occasions. So she dutifully carries on, and when her small repertoire of magic tricks runs out, she tries consulting a couple of books on the subject.
It’s often very funny when, after an elaborate set-up, one of her magic tricks fails to come off. Anything to do with playing cards is instantly blamed on a hapless audience member. And it’s equally a nice surprise, especially to Haywood herself, when a trick actually works. But the trouble with this set-up is that there are only two ways anything can go, so the surprises diminish.
Haywood is particularly good at engaging with the audience, though on this occasion it feels as if she is mainly playing to her friends, who prove to be reliable straight men (if that’s the word).
The soundtrack is fun, especially the supposedly accidental playing of extracts of some old-fashioned sex instructor. The sex jokes themselves are droll enough, but nothing quite hits the spot.
Runs until 6 August 2025
Camden Fringe runs until 24 August 2024
