Comedy: Emmy Blotnick: Party Nights, Underbelly, Bristo Square

As a neurotic Jewish millennial, Emmy Blotnick pretty much glories in decadent Western culture eating itself, the New Yorker's spirit incident the unlikely appearance of rapper Nicki Minaj at a 13-year-old boy's bar mitzvah for an eye-watering amount of money.
Emmy Blotnick: Party Nights, Underbelly, Bristo Square (Venue 302)Emmy Blotnick: Party Nights, Underbelly, Bristo Square (Venue 302)
Emmy Blotnick: Party Nights, Underbelly, Bristo Square (Venue 302)

Emmy Blotnick: Party Nights, Underbelly, Bristo Square, * * *

An expert, or sucker, depending on your perspective, on self-help books, vitamin supplements and meditation tapes, she's astute enough to recognise her rampant insecurities and sufficiently witty to isolate and amusingly critique their cultural underpinnings.

Desperately seeking self-affirmation, she finds inspiration in the vulnerability of Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps and the ridiculously unshakeable confidence of Salma Hayek. Starring in her fantasies of big, muscular men, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson provokes some unabashed lust and more complex inner soul searching, while she's very funny awakening to the dubiety of a class of white women learning to dance like Beyoncé.

Although she tends to the insular and idiosyncratic, she's adept at teasing out and breaking down broader issues, like the negative psychological impact of social media and the feminism failings of video games and sportswear stores. Breezily engaging, while never threatening to flip the world on its head, this is a competent debut from a likeable comic.

JAY RICHARDSON

Until 26 August