by Amber Pathak

Sukh Ojla brings tonnes of charm to the stage as she takes us through the grievances of a single, 30-something Punjabi woman living with her parents.

Without using any gimmicks, we hear anecdotes of Ojla’s family. The scene set by her natural storytelling ability. Despite having a totally different upbringing, her 4’10” mum’s persistent talk about marriage, her grumbling dad’s embarrassing intrusions, and the awkwardness of living in a tight-knit, Asian community in Gravesend is familiar. Taking an audience of different backgrounds and getting everyone to empathise with you is an incredibly difficult thing to achieve – Ojla doing so with such ease is a mark of her expert craftsmanship. This is because Ojla is also an actor; who takes advantage of her performance skills in various sketches, too. The recurring passive-aggressive-complainer is particularly convincing.

The whole show is fairly clean by today’s standards. There’s a naughty quip or two, though given the strict precedence set, even soap would feel dirty. It’s refreshing in this era of seriousness to watch a whole hour of nothing but pure-hearted comedy. You don’t need to punch up or down, just inwards.

There’s a good balance of scripted jokes and riffing off of the audience, enough call-backs to keep the ad-libbing relevant, but not so much that it overshadows the material. Some jokes are told in Punjabi, and like all jokes in a language I don’t understand (which is, embarrassingly, any language other than English), they didn’t land like they do in their native tongue, even with translation. This isn’t a bother, there is plenty of English material to get laughs from.

Discussing everything from dating to depression, this show has something for everyone. Ending with a sweet but serious note on mental health is a nice touch, and evidence that Sukh Ojla is the loveliest comedian you’ll see at the Vaults this year.

Life Sukhs runs through 20 February.

The Play’s the Thing UK is committed to covering fringe and progressive theatre in London and beyond. It is run entirely voluntarily and needs regular support to ensure its survival. For more information and to help The Play’s the Thing UK provide coverage of the theatre that needs reviews the most, visit its patreon.