Francesca D’Uva Works It All Out Onstage
With a solo show about grief and life, the comedian and composer brings her experimental musical comedy to an Off Broadway audience.Francesca D’Uva moved across the rehearsal room, singing and dancing, making the space her playground.Her voice jumped from a guttural, emo-metal drone to a high-pitched, almost operatic belt to a soft serenade. She played a surreal cast of characters: a sexy nurse from a Wii game she used to play; British children looking for the nanny of their dreams; Shakira.The show was an emotional pinball machine, seeming to invite laughter and tears. In one scene, she conjured the memory of her kindergarten Nativity play in which she was cast as a cow.“Everybody’s laughing at me, everybody’s mooing at me,” she sang.A familiar face in New York’s alternative comedy scene, Ms. D’Uva, 30, performs regularly at venues around the city and has appeared on television in “Three Busy Debras” and “Fantasmas.” Vulture named her a “Comedian You Should and Will Know” in 2024.Ms. D’Uva’s dramatic instincts find an outlet during the show in a range of characters, including at least one Colombian pop star.Jeenah Moon for The New York TimesWith the Off Broadway premiere this week of “This Is My Favorite Song,” her solo show at Playwrights Horizons in Midtown Manhattan, she takes her genre-defying act to a new arena.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More
