Rotos: US Receptionist Review – A barbed MAGA satire with a very funny star | stage

THis show arrives in London in an inevitable week in American politics. On the one hand, audiences may feel there’s only so much Trumpian lunacy they can take, and it also means that newcomer Lee Douglas’s satirical one-woman show – a sold-out show at last year’s Edinburgh Festival – can’t seem timely.

The Irish-born, US-raised comedian plays Chastity Quirk, a sorority girl turned White House receptionist who works for President Ronald Drumpf, whose administration is largely sexist (and other “bigots” alongside them). She begins the show with a fervor for conservatism and a love of MAGA-style beauty standards, asking the audience to shout out if they believe in “[making] “America is hot again,” and moves suggestively whenever she gets the chance.

She insists that Chastity is not just “a window dressing for Drumpf’s management,” and sees herself as an important part of his operation. But the disembodied narrator—also in Chastity’s voice—hints at trouble to come. We learned that Drumpf plans to remain in office illegally after two terms. Chastity is privy to his plots, but will she do as she’s told and quietly burn the incriminating documents her boss secreted in a Whole Foods carrier bag?

Douglas is a very funny actor, playing not only Chastity but also a host of side characters in this 70-minute show, ably directed by Fiona Kingwell. For Drumpf’s men, they tend to have bad postures and lecherous looks, while the women are lively and largely coquettish, and the sparse ensemble never seems too limited to bend to each new character.

Although it is very fun at first, it slowly wears thin. As we sway unevenly towards the end of the show, the gags become less cruel and the lines more broad, among them a quote from the oft-quoted poem “First They Came” by Martin Niemöller, about indifference in the face of Nazism (“First they came for the migrant families,” he laments the chastity, “and I said nothing, because I wanted the boys to love me”).

The show ends on a tense and abrupt note, diminishing the more prickly moments of satire. However, there is much to appreciate here, and Douglas and Kingwell succeed in identifying what makes MAGA women special: not just the desire to be beautiful, but the lust for power as well.