Dry Ice (Manchester)

Nina is a stripper. She’s good at it, and she likes the money. She knows it isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but she also knows how to give the punters as good as she gets – “What does your mother think?”. But now her blissfully-unaware religious mum is actually coming to stay, how will Nina handle it?

Writer and performer Sabrina Mahfouz rattles adeptly through a whole cast of characters, from Nina and the girls in the strip club dressing room, through a gamut of punters from the drenched-in-cheap-aftershave to the suave Russian millionaire, and on to a dinner party with her art (drug) dealer boyfriend, where the other guests bray “Do you ski, Nina?”

Directed by Friends star David Schwimmer, Dry Ice is a captivating character portrait and Mahfouz’s seamless delivery gives you the sensation of being personally drawn into Nina’s confidence. Nina tells her story through smart, funny and poignant prose-poetry, and the characters are wittily, vividly drawn.

Running at just 45 minutes, there’s still an element of the work-in-progress here, but this only means you’re left wanting more. Book as part of Flying Solo’s double bill offer and make a night of it.

– Harriet Judd

(Reviewed at Contact, Manchester)