Credit: Steve Ullathorne


Ruby is interviewing herself. From a chair she sometimes sprawls in, sometimes does leg stretches again, she asks herself questions about stress, mindfulness and being frazzled. Is there more stress now than ever? Are all your problems caused by your parents? Are people who take part in mindfulness just selfish?

To be ‘frazzled’, Wax explains, isn’t stress. It’s stressing about stress. As she explains cortisol rushes, and long- vs short-term stressors, it’s clear that Frazzled is part lecture, part therapy session, part self-help group. Each question Wax asks herself is followed by an anecdote from her life: the time, 15 years ago, she interviewed Donald Trump in a helicopter when he told her he wanted to be President, or the more recent occasion wherein she got a degree in psychotherapy and then a Masters from Oxford.

Wax leads the audience in a mindfulness exercise, before calling back to an earlier joke for a Hawaiian dance finale. Her last piece of advice lingers: find yourself, then go save the world.

Until Sun 26 Aug, Pleasance Courtyard, 4pm, £18-£20 (£16-£18).