As patrons entered the Wild Oats Wine Bar in Enmore Theatre to take their seats, they discovered a woman wearing large red triangular shoulder-pads, knee-high boots and a red corset sat on a chair at the rear of the stage with her back to the room.

Silent and slightly sinister, immobile in the corner she looked like a character from the Blair Witch Project, except that the Blair Witch victim didn’t wear a corset – at least not in the family-friendly version of the film I watched.

Scattered on the stage around her were small rectangular pieces of ruled white card with hand-written subjects, perhaps prompts for jokes, perhaps song titles, perhaps talk topics for the conversationally challenged. They included:

Suicide Hormones

Dogs Dirty

Private Cupcakes

Song Camel

Funeral #

Breast Implants

Survey Dad

Santa

As the lights dimmed, Alice Fraser – the ginger-haired, red-corseted woman in the corner – rose and turned to face the crowd. She began by explaining that her outlandish costume evolved as a result of liking comic book superheroes as a child, evoking a desire to design her own sassy uniform with high pointed shoulders.

Thereafter she began a rapid-fire 45-minute monologue with scarcely a breath that included witty anecdotes and amusing observations with several recurring characters – such as her Buddhist dad and a friend named ‘Dave.’ The latter apparently has low opinions and even lower expectations of women, which for the most part provoked much laughter.

Fraser is a clever and well-rehearsed performer and I’ve no doubt she’d make an excellent dinner party companion. While pondering on the nature of good and evil, her material meanders between the realms of thoughtful and thought-provoking, or, by her own loquacious summary: “quantum physics/existential deconstruction disguised as comedy.”

She is intimate with the crowd but not provocative; with occasional interaction and banter with the audience. Several people, myself included, received individual cards with suggestive notes written upon them. Mine read, “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? I’ve been burned so badly I want to throw up,” although quite how that pertains to me I remain perplexed (!).

One amusing sketch of Fraser’s involved an impromptu love song performed on a banjo to a random fellow in the audience named Chris.

After the show, Fraser stood by the exit and hugged or shook hands with everyone as they left, an act of intimacy unexpected in a comedian – although perhaps not unusual for a superhero.