Syd

Syd by Claudia Jefferies.

Syd is a surly comedian and gender illusionist. He appears suddenly when a handheld lamp clicks on in a dark theatre. He practices telling jokes and messes up the punchlines.

He rants about flies. It slowly becomes apparent that he has something more important to say as his jokes are replaced with grim anecdotes, in between fits of karaoke.

Syd is a work-in-progress devised show about being a woman in men’s space. It’s about being harassed, objectified, infantilised and dehumanised; about being invisible as people, but hyper-visible as objects.

It’s about how they’re so often viewed as property, public and private and why we’re not just left alone to mind our business.

More specifically, Syd is about the fear that this engenders and how many of us modify our behaviour in order to stay safe, both physically and emotionally. It’s about how all the above makes you want to fight and scream, but also makes you want to hide behind a moustache and a heartthrob wig.

Syd is a one woman show starring a bad, bad man.