Ailments

It seems like an age since we last saw Hayley Sproull live on stage. A quick glance back through my blog reveals that it was 2018! Since that time, Hayley has been, well, busy! She’s starred in Golden Boy, Educators and Funny Girls, hosts her own show HYBPANZ, co-hosts New Zealand Bake-Off and ZM Radio’s breakfast show, is a regular on shows such as Seven Days, Patriot Brains and HYBPAA, and is generally everywhere. No wonder she doesn’t have time for standup!

 But she’s managed to make a hole in her schedule to return to her home town, Wellington, and perform her new show, Ailments. This is a musical show about, unsurprisingly, her ailments. And there are a lot of them! After doing a quick lap of the auditorium to say hello to everyone, she starts with a song (with a very long intro – so she can get her breath back) which basically lists all the things that are, or have ever been, wrong with her. This is a rich source of comedy as she shares, and overshares, her number of kidneys (below the accepted average), the shape of her uterus, and the effects that her recent diagnosis of polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS) has had upon her body, including weight gain which has led to her having proper boobies at last! Yay! But also bingo wings (boo!); hair growing everywhere, except upon her head, where it falls out instead. She throws light on the treatments for hair growth and how there’s always “extras” added to the bill…like you’re going to leave your toes hairy after doing your legs. Yup, that costs more. She interspersed her musings with a handful of songs, and left us wanting more. It’s an our-long show but feels like it’s longer. Definitely worth the wait, don’t leave it so long next time!