Comedy Festival 2018: Celia Pacquola walks the walk in All Talk ★★★★½

CELIA Pacquola leaves no doubt she can walk the walk with quipping yarns, self-discovery and frequent left-turns in a state of her nation address.

CELIA Pacquola’s rise as an accomplished actor has been hasty. So hasty and natural that a friend, upon learning I’m off to review her, asks “Does she do stand-up as well?” For those joining us fresh from Rosehaven and Utopia on iView, and fans of her intellectually offbeat turns in Offspring and Laid, yes, Pacquola is a stand-up comedian first, it’s her bread and butter, and she’s making serious bread tonight with a near-sold out show at Comedy Theatre, her Comedy Festival home court since 2016.

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Her huggable, protean charm comes across well, even if she loses a few of the rolling, roiling laughs she provoked in small rooms at Melbourne Town Hall five years ago. She’s outgrown those spaces. Her star is hurtling in orbit.

Thing is, while Pacquola’s professional life was flying in 2017 she let a few things go. Namely her coping strategies for depression and anxiety. Pacquola mines this material without it feeling exploitative and skilfully “unpacks” (such an overused verb) the post-Weinstein world where men and women don’t know whether to hug or not.

Celia Pacquola’s huggable, protean charm comes across well in All Talk. Picture: Supplied

Pacquola riffs on the #MeToo movement’s pros and cons at great personal cost, worried that she’s being a bad feminist, a niggling feeling that bothers many females I know, like they don’t have enough hoops to jump through daily.

Celia has always been adept at ratatating three quick jokes, swift drum-fills, and using call-backs like choruses, right when we need them to provide levity from a wincing sex-tape tale.

Pacquola’s bits on a not-so-innocent bystander, modern rap music (“rappings”) and the insidious cloud serve a pacy narrative. Clearly, she’s finely tuned this show after performing an encore run of The Looking Glass last year (which you can view on STAN, sports fans).

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Her natural, hasty gesticulations and arched eyebrows (which convey a range of emotions from sarcastic to self-satisfied) play to all 997 seats in the house.And she may have the best burn on wearable weed in this year’s festival.

There’s a sly dig at the ABC fans who turned up perhaps hoping All Talk was about Van Diemen’s Land and societal framework.

Without putting too cute a bow on it — that’s not her style — very few will leave Pacquola’s show thinking she can’t walk the walk.

Celia Pacquola, All Talk

Comedy Theatre, 240 Exhibition St, city. Until April 22.

comedyfestival.com.au