At the start of her set, Catherine Bohart talks us through what “borrowing trouble” means: to fret needlessly about the future, before one has sufficient cause. Despite her dad’s attempts to remind her not to borrow trouble, Catherine can’t help but doing the opposite, and her show loosely follows this red thread to hilariously unpack her life, relationships and mental health.

Borrowing Trouble is personal and unfiltered. It’s also fast, with Bohart talking at the speed of light and unapologetically jumping from topic to topic (without worrying too much about segues, which, she says, are not her strong suit). She also picks up on the audience’s reactions in a flash and runs with them as far as she can go, which makes the rest of the room exhilarated (and relieved not to be the ones caught in the crossfire).

Once adjusted to the relentless pace, Borrowing Trouble is actually comfortable to follow. Before her 60 minutes are up, Catherine talks about her Irish identity, especially tied to her Catholic upbringing; her OCD and mental health journey; her queerness, her family and her relationship to stand-up itself. Interspersed are comical episodes involving lesbian weddings, John Lewis’s miraculous customer service, and annoying dog people, as well as omnipresent jabs at the English in the room. Every so often, she tests the boundaries of the audience, poking at topics like religion, queerness and mental health just daringly enough to delight in a bit of awkward silence.

It’s the first time Bohart talks about her OCD in one of her sets since her first show at Edinburgh Fringe, back in 2018. She reflects on her experience of building her first stand up show around personal experiences, which then encouraged journalists and audiences to blur (and in some cases, completely annihilate) significant boundaries. Embedded in there is an interesting reflection around the inherent vulnerability of comedy (and theatre) drawing directly from the creator’s life, and the fine line separating the stand-up persona from the actual self, especially at the start of one’s career.

Borrowing Trouble is a solid showcase of flow-of-consciousness, quick-witted comedy. Bohart has a flair for immersing the audience into her life and her inner world from the first minute of the show; by the end, you’ll feel a bit like you know her.

Borrowing Trouble is playing at Soho Theatre (Dean Street) until the 3rd of October.

★ ★ ★ ★

Written by Greta for Theatre and Tonic, September 2026.

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