Review by Eli Cairns
Got your nose! Got your funny bone, too.
One for the parents and the still-a-kid-at-hearts, Samantha Hannah’s Peekaboo! is a cheeky and sarcastic show about the most dire delights and disasters of motherhood. While preparing to welcome her second child, Hannah reflects on a plethora of hilarious moments with her first, and presents us a keen selection of anecdotes around pregnancy, birth, and raising her son. Between mix-ups with doctors at the hospital, the outrageous misgivings of beloved New Zealand children’s books, and the unique, three-piece-suited agony her husband experiences being a Phoenix fan in Wellington, this show packs a punch in its playground of fun on offer, and proudly showcases Hannah’s storytelling expertise.
Although at the start Hannah suggests that Peekaboo! is a ‘work in progress’ on a potential kids’ show for the future, it later proves much more well-rounded and much less kids-friendly than she initially lets on. Built around showcasing the bests and worsts of being a first-time mum, its humour is undercut with a personal flair, hand-tailored to Hannah’s own experiences which make it exciting and sometimes concerningly specific. Its strongest moments are marked throughout with running-joke video clips that compliment her storytelling, compounding on each other to hammer home the punchlines. Further, while the show’s set at first appears simple, it’s quickly revealed to have a plethora of props, puppets, and baby toys to entertain even the most TikTok-brained of audience members, and Hannah hands these out liberally throughout the show.
Samantha Hannah herself is a natural and witty comedian. With a deliciously dry sense of humour, she takes a tough-cookie approach to the harsher parts of life and isn’t scared to lean into cynicism with her comedy. Yet, it’s plain to see in the show’s more sincere moments that Hannah is having just as much fun as we are recounting her stories, and she determinedly makes light of grim situations. Although by day she must balance the life of a tired mum, on stage she is practiced and precise, making for an entertaining comic and compelling storyteller.
If you’ve ever been a child, or perhaps have some of your own, Peekaboo! promises to warm your nostalgia over a fire of smoldering jokes. No matter if it’s Hairy Maclary or breastfeeding in a Muffin Break, Samantha Hannah delivers an earnest performance perfect for a light hour of comedy, and a loveable retrospective on eighteen months’ worth of laughs.
Where’d she go? Where’d she go? Peekaboo!
Disclosure: As a somewhat active member of the Wellington performing arts community, I may be quite familiar with a number of the performers in this show. Having said that, I am not a liar, and there is zero bias in my reviews, shut up.
Also, tickets were provided to me for free by the production. Literally changes nothing, though