For me, last year Rose Matafeo was The One That Got Away. I could not fit her into my overpacked review schedule and missed her hit show Rose Matafeo is Finally Dead. Everybody was talking about it and I missed it. So this year I made sure Rose Matafeo: Sassy Best Friend was on my review spreadsheet (yeah I have a review spreadsheet now) and got my seat at her romantic comedy themed sold out show in the Pleasance Courtyard.
The premise of the show is that Rose has been playing the sassy best friend trope in her own life, but just once Rosie wants us to look beyond her glasses and just maybe fall in love with her. Or rather she wants Jayson-with-a-Y-in-the-front-row to fall in love with her. She certainly is loveable, Rose is a very open performer who is able to keep the high pace of this show up without allowing the speed of her quick fire gags run away with her.
In order to be the sassy best friend of romantic comedy fame, you have to have lived through an awkward childhood. And it sounds like Rose’s was awkward, an all girls school pupil, dressed by her mother in ill thought out slogan t-shirts, Rose brought up the interesting personality type of the extroverted introvert. Essentially a person who struggles with eye contact but lives for the stage.
An endearingly quirky show with plenty of gags and little skits – Rose even generously shares her theories behind Michael Jackson’s vocal tics – the audience is left in no doubt that Rose is taking the lead in her life.
★★★★
Rose Matafeo is at the Pleasance Courtyard at 21:45 until 27th August. For tickets and more information click here!
