Review: Vix Leyton: Antihero

Considering what an upbeat, vivacious presence at the mic Vix Leyton is, and that she's still yet to hit 40, there's a strong motif of death running through Antihero. But then it's also not so surprising given that she's an inveterate people pleaser with a naïve streak; ignorant about betrayal as only someone unfamiliar with Francis Ford Coppola's oeuvre can be, and only wise about ill-advised romantic pursuits after the fact. So the odds are stacked against the Welsh stand-up matching her mother for longevity and notoriety, a strongly sketched character here who combines easily triggered suspicion of others with mounting evidence that she herself may be harbouring a dark secret. A bond seemingly based on mutual misunderstanding, the mother-daughter relationship is at the heart of Antihero and it's a frequently very funny one, with the comic's mum affording her plenty of wildcard theories that she can wryly deconstruct. Also amusing are Leyton's reflections on dating an autistic person, her patient need to explain herself forcing her to confront her own failings directly.

Everything builds organically to Leyton planning her own funeral, with some lovely ideas for her acquiring maximum posthumous cred. But the show's ending still arrives a little perfunctorily, and needlessly so when the performance as a whole clocks in at around 45 minutes long.