Love Songs is the true story of a hopeless romantic encountering the millennial dating world and understanding her own British Chinese identity in the midst of all the highs and lows. This one-woman show by Alissa Anne Jeun Yi is thrilling, funny, honest, heartbreaking and empowering all in one hilarious and healing show.
The show started as a way to find closure from the performer’s personal experience of sexual assault. Alissa took a painful story and created an empowering and ultimately dynamic performance out of it, creating a story of positivity and power. The show is ambitious, mixing rap, classic dance-floor love songs, spoken word, comedy, and audience participation into one big pot to form a positive outlook on love and life. There are points where the performance feels a little jittery in amidst all of the collective action, and some of the links between stories could do with some polishing, but Alissa’s down-to-earth attitude has her audience relating to all of her stories.
Alissa’s performance is altogether brave and powerful, tackling an enormous autobiographical story and complex themes. She shines with her combination of authoritative poetry and comedy, her facial expressions enormous as she takes on the hyper-sexualisation of East Asian woman and the excitement and embarrassment of flirting. With Alissa’s brilliant dance moves, some cleverly used props, and a whole load of brutal honesty, this show is about encouraging others to be comfortable in their own skin and to learn to heal our tragedies with laughter.
Be ready for an honest and intimate performance of pain and laughter, of teenage crushes and first loves, and the people who get us through it all. You will leave having laughed and cried in equal measure from the performer’s thought-provoking and hilarious performance.
Times: 2-14, 16-26, August, 2:40pm