REVIEW: In A Bad Way, Isolde Fenton, Edinburgh Fringe 2026 ★★★★

Grá is sick. With what, she’s not sure. But here she is sitting in a GP in Dublin (for the fifth time this month) and won’t rest until she has a diagnosis. Isolde Fenton brings up her debut comedic, touching, fast-paced one woman show about hypochondria, grief and coming of age.

At the surface In a Bad Way tells of girl sitting in her small GPs office praying for any diagnosis (bum cancer, arm amputation, the list goes awkwardly on) but what’s revealed is a young woman’s coming of age in a new city after her life changes on a dime following the most impactful loss of her life.

What is marketed as a story solely about emetophobia and hypochondria, this tale is so much more. We see each relationship she has with the people around her and how she feels about them are so deeply connected, from a boyfriend named after a herb to a GP who asks too many unrelated questions and the moments between roommates and family which hit us all in the feels, no detail is left out and in this hour we have learnt so much about this girl we feel we’ve known her our entire lives, even down the small details.

Fenton delivers Grá’s story with elegance and the relation of a woman who knows her path well. Especially her accents and characterisation throughout as over 10 characters are sensational. She is an incredible performer and to add, she does all of this after performing another show an hour before! It takes a really incredible (and insane) performer to do so and this is one who is exceptional at her work.

Weaving in her own Irish experience with references that will make you feel nostalgic to the Irish audiences or the ones who have grown up watching this culture on TV, the parts as Gaelige sprinkled in, the old TV shows references and in those small moments, she doesn’t feel like a character we are watching on stage anymore.

This is a show made by the girls for the girls but also any neurodivergent person who feels life is just that bit too overwhelming and by consequence, their body acts in strange ways

You can catch In A Bad Way at Gilded Balloon Patter House until 31 Aug (not 17 and 24) at 14:20 (60mins). Tickets are available to book through the Edinburgh Fringe Online Box Office.