Sydney Comedy Festival 2026

Feral

Written and performed by Rachael Sue Ragland

Be My BFFFFFF

Written and performed by John Glover

The Factory, Marrickville

Reviewed on May 2

Reviewed by Ron Lee, CSP

From an audience perspective, performances at comedy festivals are hit and miss. 

Last year my companion and I walked out of a performance after five minutes, leaving eight audience members in the room. At another venue, we picked up on the vibe of the place and the audience that was waiting to enter the room and left before the show started.

At The Factory at this year’s festival we’ve so far seen Rachael Sue Ragland in Feral and John Glover in Be My BFFFFFF. 

Ragland is a woman who is "differently proportioned" or "plus-sized". She emerged wearing a bikini top and a g-string. By her own description she has oak tree legs, and "thunder thighs". I've only seen a few Rugby players with legs that big and powerful. We can only speculate as to what she could do with those things. 

She lifts 150 kilos and talked about her life of dating, sport, sex, her day job, the radical major surgery that she elected to have and her new venture that involves fruit juice, including watermelons, that she squeezes in an unconventional way. Yes, whatever you’ve just imagined will probably be right.

Ragland knew a lot of people in the room, and even though she predominantly played to a man named Matt in the front row, stage left, she kept the audience engaged through interaction, her narrative skills and that she is unafraid to express her vulnerability.

In Be My BFFFFFF, John Glover talked about what it's like to be a gay man who is desperate to make friends. His performance was also very interactive and we all contributed to his scrapbook. Significantly and respectfully, he asked for permission before he involved any members of the audience.

Glover’s performance went over well with the full house that consisted mostly of gay men. While we were waiting to go in, the air was filled with expectation and chatter and there was so much sibilance that we thought that air was being released from something.

Some of the higher level individual shows are less about jokes and more about autobiographical story telling and all are catharses. Both shows hit those marks.