FOLLOWING a six-year hiatus after a horrific stalking ordeal, American comedian Anna Akana has returned to the stage at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival to talk about her sister's suicide and her own trauma in a dark-humoured but responsible show.
Armed with a restraining order and a bunch of new stories to tell, Akana’s appropriately titled It Gets Darker deep dives into the nuances of suicide as she explores her battles with mental health and coming to terms with her sister's death in a morbidly intimate hour-long gig.
The 34-year-old lost her little sister Christina back in 2007 when she was just 17 years old and decided to take up stand-up comedy as an outlet for her grief two years later.
Fellow American comedian Margaret Cho partly inspired Akana to pursue stand-up, as she said growing up the only Asian faces you would see in popular culture were Lucy Liu, Jet Li and Jackie Chan.
“Margaret’s set was, like, so raunchy and so funny and so subversive, it really inspired me to do that as well,” she said.
She added: “It was the first time I really laughed in a couple of years, and it was the first time I didn't feel bogged down by my sister's death.
“So, comedy became this sort of shining north star for me.”
Akana performed stand-up for a decade before deciding to quit in 2018 because of death threats from a stalker who threatened to come and shoot her at one of her shows.
She feared that she would suffer the same fate as Christina Grimmie – a singer and YouTube star who was shot dead at a meet and greet back in 2016 – and Akana described the threats as “really scary”.
She started having panic attacks on stage, ending shows early, and started taking antidepressants as she struggled with her mental health.
Spending time away from comedy gave Akana (below) the chance to focus on her mental wellbeing and hone her writing skills as a comedian.
After feeling the “itch” to return to stand-up, she focuses her routine on the experience of being stalked and feels she’s finally mature enough to tackle the complexities of finding the funny side of her sister's death.
She said: “I felt like I was finally a skilled enough comedian to tackle that because in my twenties, I tried to do it, and it was just like shock humor, it was offensive and not good.
“I feel like I now know how to do this without ever punching down or even punching at myself.”
Using psychological studies and facts about mental health, Akana also weaves advice from her own therapist into the show to give it a digestible and informative feeling which is also packed full of laughs.
She expertly breaks down the heavy subject matter with well-timed “dumb” and “silly” jokes which cut straight through any sadness her audience may feel to make the show a more entertaining watch.
“I wrote it intentionally with the idea that I never wanted to punch down, I never wanted to make people feel like I wasn't giving it the respect and the seriousness it deserves,” she explained.
“I really wanted to write something that was both educational and entertaining but like, really silly and really fun.”
Akana wants her sister's story to help people and is often approached after her performances by fans who have had similar experiences around suicide.
She said sharing how much her sister was loved and how wonderful she was as a person helped to alleviate any guilt she felt around her death.
As much as the show is about finding laughter in the small amount of light during dark periods of life, it offers an educational and informative experience for the audience too.
Akana said: “It's been really beautiful. I was worried people would watch the show and think it's a bummer and I don't want that, but I really wanted to make it a celebration of life instead of just purely an examination of death.”
She’s also hoping that the Scottish audience will resonate with her style of comedy as the country’s reputation for indulging in self-deprecating humour precedes itself.
This is Akana’s first Fringe experience, and she is hoping her style of responsible dark comedy will find its home in Edinburgh as she said Scotland has been calling her for some time.
It Gets Darker takes audiences through an emotional wringer but is mature in its message and articulates how to cope with grief and the conversations around mental health.
“I really do try to give people the tools of how to talk to someone who's suicidal because I feel like most of the time, we have a loved one who doesn't necessarily know how to talk about it, and we don't want to say the wrong thing,” she said.
Speaking from her own firsthand trauma, Akana delivers a sobering combination of understanding the thoughts and feelings of people who suffer mental health crises while explaining how to approach conversations around the subject.
Delivered with equal measures of dry wit and hilarious gags, It Gets Darker expertly finds the funny within tough societal issues. It shows that no matter how dark life gets, there is always something to laugh about.
It Gets Darker runs from July 31 to August 24 at Pleasance Courtyard – upstairs at 5:30pm every day, except August 5, 12, and 19.
Tickets and information for the show can be found here.
Anyone who is suffering with their mental health or is having suicidal thoughts can contact the NHS at 111 or Samaritans at 116 123. Both lines are open 24 hours a day.
