At Little Squirt, we follow Darby James, an Australian musical comedian, on his sperm donation process and concurrent existential crisis. The show is packed with clever rhymes, plenty of bodily fluid-based puns, and asks the difficult questions about life. The audience is spared none of the details of the process, and I guess it’s no accident that it’s performed in the Anatomy Lecture Theatre in Summerhall.
It’s a relatively simple story: a young gay man decides to donate sperm after seeing an ad on Facebook. The real crux of the show is the questions that are asked along the way. The main question is whether we, humans, should be having children at all, given the impending climate disaster and general trials and tribulations of being alive.
The show is written and performed by Darby, and after winning a slew of awards in Australia, he is giving the show its deserved international debut. Little Squirt is almost entirely sung, and the performance is very tight, with Darby having a strong command of the material and the room. One particular highlight is a song about the type of father the actor would be, which plays much more into the absurd, and really displays Darby’s strength as a musical comedian.
The show has a running metaphor of Darby being stuck on “the island of ambiguity,” which is the inspiration for the nautical theme staging and promotion. While Darby does not leave his small sand-coloured carpet-island for the entire performance, this metaphor does feel slightly redundant for the majority of the show. It is, however, utilised for a meaningful finale, where some heartfelt answers to the show’s difficult questions are offered.
Little Squirt gives us a heartfelt and thought-provoking look into the complicated world of sperm donation. The journey is filled with well-sung songs, charmingly rude sperm jokes, and gives genuine and enjoyable attempts at asking some of the most important questions in life.
