POST FROM THE FRINGE: Ansa’s Back, and She’s Not Just the Funny Friend Anymore…
Now then, theatre lovers — pop the kettle on and cancel your plans, because I’ve got Fringe news hotter than a tech run with no air con.
Award-winning storyteller and all-round tour de force Ansa Edim is back at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe with her smash-hit solo show, Is This Normal?, and this year’s version is even sharper, braver, and more magnetic than ever. After dazzling audiences with a ★★★★ debut in 2024, she’s levelled up — and let me tell you, this is no warm-up act. This is the full, firecracker headliner.
Ansa is a Moth StorySLAM Champion, a Kennedy Center performer, a podcast guest of actual Lupita Nyong’o, and — I kid you not — the kind of storyteller that makes you laugh till you wheeze and then suddenly hits you with a line that’ll live in your ribcage for months. Her stories explore the absurd beauty of dating, identity, fatness, and Black womanhood in a world that loves to overlook people like her — and she does it with such wit, vulnerability, and bite that you’ll be rooting for her within minutes.
Raised on raw honesty and sharpened by spite (her words, not mine), Is This Normal? isn’t just a show — it’s a reckoning. You’ll come for the laughs and stay for the gut punches. Oh, and did I mention she’s scooped up awards like Best Storytelling and The Extension Award at NYC Fringe? She’s not playing, babes.
And let’s not forget the woman steering this ship behind the scenes: Sriya Sarkar, a dynamo of a director with a background that reads like a TED Talk waiting to happen. Sriya’s a digital storyteller, filmmaker, and ex-comic with serious chops. She’s worked across everything from Upworthy to political campaigns, and co-founded the South Asian Sexual & Mental Health Alliance. Basically, if she’s involved, it’s going to make you feel something — and probably make you want to change the world while you’re at it.
Together, Ansa and Sriya are a dream duo. This show is raw and riotous, yes — but it’s also razor-sharp and rooted in something real. It’s about shame, friendship, survival, and self-love. It’s about standing in your truth, even if your voice shakes (or your Spanx roll down mid-monologue).
So here’s your Fringe dispatch from Grace Hatchell, Special Courier for Emotional Knockouts and Unmissable Theatre: Is This Normal? is an hour that might just change how you see yourself. It’s got heart, guts, giggles, and a lot of love for those of us who’ve spent too long on the sidelines.
Tickets? Get them. Emotions? Buckle up.
Is This Normal? | Edinburgh Festival Fringe
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