Suzi Ruffell: The Juggle – Òran Mór, Glasgow

With her restless anxiety and self-esteem issues, critiquing Suzi Ruffell feels a bit redundant or even bullying. She might be sporting a hands-free “Britney mic” but it’s less pop princess pretension than enabling her agitated pacing of the stage.

Prompted by the insecurities of a young fan, she’s been reminded of her most embarrassing moments at school. And while she attributes a dickhead vibe to comedians generally, she’s swift to acknowledge that she, in particular, excels at messing up, even turning the recent triumph of her book’s publication into a self-doxxing.

You might think being a stand-up is cool. But Ruffell’s here to disabuse you. Lying to cabbies is understandable, given the stereotype of their reactionary opinions. But its teenage girls that hold a particular terror for the comic. Recalling an exchange at a children’s party, she’s cut to the quick by a mean girl who dismisses Ruffell’s desire to entertain as desperately thirsty, an “ick”, and hardly behaviour becoming someone who’s just turned 40.

And it’s here that Ruffell is in something of a bind. Still scared of spiders and ghosts, when she attempts adulting, she almost kills her neighbours.

But she’s also aware that her six-year-old daughter’s view of her is beginning to change. Hitherto, she’s been everything to the girl, a hero and role model. But now, with innocent persecution, the child has begun stoking Ruffell’s fears about her looks and personality. And it’s the comedian who’s having the tougher time adjusting, with the spectre of those difficult teenage years looming on the horizon.

There were mitigating circumstances in Ruffell’s difficult adolescence. No progressive cartoons like Bluey for instance, featuring same sex parents; her dad, though good-hearted was rather slack in terms of treating her to age-appropriate entertainment. And as her school presentation showed, this natural performer hadn’t quite found the genre of entertainment she was destined to excel in, though some of her variety turn skills get an airing in the encore.

Ruffell’s admission of using cosmetic enhancements is brave, reflecting the pressures placed on women in the public eye. But she most truly stands up for herself aligning fuller self-acceptance of her sexuality with getting older. And by countering misguided bigotry as she lay prone in a particularly awkward situation, responding with grace and tolerance, despite wider resurgence of the far-right and homophobia.

The Juggle generally makes its point about the pressures of motherhood and maintaining a career light-heartedly, with Ruffell’s generous, chatty nature and clownish self-deprecation a big part of her appeal

Some of the anecdotes feel a bit stretched for inclusion. The section about ghosts, which features an old story about touring with Josh Widdecombe, a so-so spooky tale from her Òran Mór venue and the solicitations of some crowd experiences of hauntings, inexplicably closes the first half, as it’s weak and overlong. Her vicarious enjoyment of a friend’s return to dating also seems tangential and perhaps not funny enough to justify its place.

But Ruffell is good company as always. And her offhand, caustic swipe at Ed Sheeran demonstrates that even the most reluctantly political performer ultimately needs to express their core beliefs and values.