“Sex Witch” is a healing piece

by Thomas Burns Scully, Guest Writer

It’s not often that an evening at the theatre is truly transformative. It’s the reason so many of us go, but even the most devoted patrons among us would likely agree that the elevated Dionysian high is, to put it convolutedly, elusive at best. So when a piece of theatre sees inside of you and finds a small broken part of your soul you thought was long buried… let’s just say it’s worth talking about.

“Sex Witch The Musical” is a deceptive piece. To the casual observer, a run-of-the-mill one-woman comedy with a few songs thrown in, and liberal mentions of Rupert Grint. Likely an enjoyable evening, maybe a fun bachelorette party event. However, it is just this bait and switch that gives Maggie Lalley’s show its power. By presenting externally as a racy romp, “Sex Witch” is able to Trojan Horse a haunting true narrative about trauma and cult mentality into a levitous, deftly irreverent comedy about pretending to be a witch as a teenager. It is a devious masterclass on how to tell your own story.

Lalley’s no-frills presentation and regular reassurances of “Don’t worry, I have a musical, I’m fine” do much to reinforce the idea that this is just a fun, good time. All the while though, she dares you to actually listen to what she is saying. She tells the story of her teenage life in a manner that is by turns darkly comic and darkly dark, all the while wrapping it up in a semi-manic “everything’s okay” demeanor that can only be described as quintessentially millennial.

As a young teenager, Maggie Lalley was brainwashed and manipulated by a fellow student, named in the show as Bethany. Maggie was convinced, utterly and completely, by her schoolmate that the two of them were witches with all attendant abilities. Much of the lore of this magical world was based on popular entertainment of the era: Harry Potter, Charmed, The Craft, etc. Over a period of two years, Bethany got Maggie to believe wilder and wilder untruths, all while sexually abusing her apprentice witch.

Few people could recount a story rife with such difficult subject matter and have it be as unabashedly, rip-roaringly funny as Maggie Lalley is able to. Navigating a minefield of potential pitfalls, Lalley dextrously negotiates her own story, at times paying off tension releases with carefully placed punchlines and others simply having the best hyperbole available to capitalize on the ridiculousness of her own past situation. Case in point: her assertion that she and her abuser could have simply formed an improv team rather than a sex cult, given the level of world-building the two of them were doing anyway.

All of this would make a perfectly serviceable stand-up special on its own, but then we consider the musical aspect of the show. At times the audience might wonder if Maggie’s upbeat, if relatively simply constructed, ditties are an indulgence in the piece, rather than a necessity. However, as mentioned previously, the over-assertion of “this is a musical, everything is fine” really is essential to this show’s impact. It keeps the audience on the edge of their seats the whole time because nothing quite screams “cry for help” quite as much as a woman explaining she was in a cult, repeatedly telling you everything is fine, and then jumping behind a piano to prove it.

Lalley has been developing this show for several years now and her control over the insanity of it all and her ability to channel it into the seemingly frivolous makes “Sex Witch” one of the best pieces of its kind. It is a show that is eye-opening, brazenly honest, and scary, and yet you are laughing the whole time. That places it up there with other notable entries in the genre like “Fleabag”. By now an overused benchmark for one-woman shows, but when the shoe fits etc.

But, dear reader, you were promised transformation in my opening sentence, and it would be rude not to deliver. So here goes nothing. As a reviewer, you are best advised to avoid making a review about yourself, but this is one of the few cases where it seems relevant. I can, unironically and with no pretense, say that “Sex Witch” was a, quite literal, revelation for me.

This next section took a while to write so forgive any imperfections.

All the while watching “Sex Witch” I found an intense relatability to everything I was hearing. Relatability and familiarity are natural cousins, and so at first, I assumed it was because the story reminded me of a TV show or movie I had seen some time ago. And then I remembered. Something I’d never really forgotten and had never thought of as a secret, but regardless it was something I had only told drunkenly to one friend years previously and never mentioned to another soul before or since. About my secret online pen pal. The one I had met on an online forum when I was about 16 and spoke regularly with for about two years. They were a lot older than I was.

And even now it’s hard to talk about, because, as I’ve told myself time after time after time, nothing really happened. Nothing physical. I would share my secrets. Personal things that I wasn't telling anyone. They were the first person I sent recordings of music to when I was trying to do that for the first time. But nothing happened. It was all emails and chat boxes. We were friends. Good friends. And then they declared their love for me. And then when I said no it got very ugly very quickly.

We’ll leave the details at that. I’m setting a therapy appointment.

I share this because more than anything, even now, it feels stupid to talk about. I feel stupid. For a long time that was my biggest fear about it: that I would look like an idiot if I told people this stupid, embarrassing story. Arguably my greatest fear, for whatever that says about me. But Maggie didn’t look stupid talking about it. She looked, as ever, smart, confident, and maybe a hair unhinged for comic effect, but, as she was quick to remind us, jokingly or not: she was okay.

A lot gets said about art that heals, and often to me, art that gets labeled as healing does so in the same way that a Goop product does. By which to say: not at all, but at least it looks nice and is expensive. To apply the rules of evidence-based medicine to the theatre, I can say that “Sex Witch” is a healing piece. Because it is for me. Funny, clever, insightful, boldly honest, and healing.

There isn’t really more to say than that. Look after yourselves. Go and see this show. Especially if your name is Ruper Grint.

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“Sex Witch The Musical” runs at Soho Playhouse until May 6th

Written by and Starring Maggie Lalley

www.sohoplayhouse.com/sex-witch-the-musical