Review: (Toronto) My High-Heeled Life (Fringe)

The Accidental Orgasm
by Lisa McKeown
@lisammckeown

Katharine MacLeod’s acting is as strong as her character is warm. The audience is immediately introduced to a character whose name we never learn but whom we feel we know intimately by the end of the show: “Have you ever had an accidental orgasm in the shoe department?” she asks at the top of the show? Well she has, and it’s quite the story. But this is not just a Sex in the City episode – it delves a bit deeper than that.

MacLeod’s character is bubbly but also brutally honest: “If I feel annoyed at the state of the world there’s usually a reason: the state of the world is annoying.” The structure of the show is both seductive and confessional, as MacLeod demonstrates by way of her shoe obsession the double bind that contemporary women find themselves in, encapsulated both literally and figuratively in stilettos. They are both the source of our confidence and our vulnerability. What does one do with that? How do we discover happiness in a world of creepy cat-calls and insecurity and no sense of purpose? Well, MacLeod’s character might just have a few answers. 

My High-Heeled Life is at the Toronto Fringe