A Play They Wrote Just Now… And They Absolutely Nailed It!
I knew I was in for a good time as soon as Hillary Yaas strutted on stage in a long Cruella De Vil-type coat and the biggest, most colourful wig I have ever seen. Co-creator Selena Vyle calls out to her from the stairs of the Baby Grand, and from the moment they are on stage together, the whole room feels alive. Their latest show A Play We Just Wrote – Just Now proceeds and is an hour of pure chaos and comedy.
The idea is simple. The audience, Yaas, and Vyle are going to create a play on the spot. The queens already have the wigs, costumes, puppets, and the much-needed ukulele. The audience then suggests everything else: a genre, the opening and closing locations, and a title.
Now if this were your everyday show, I would try not to give away too many details. That is completely unnecessary here since each show is completely different. At the performance I attended, the audience handed them “Dr. Seuss” as a genre. The opening location was “a tropical island,” and the ending location was “a celebrity graveyard in Los Angeles.” Lastly, the title was “La La Land The Band.” Let the theatre begin!
The Dr. Seuss twist came with an extra challenge: every line of dialogue had to rhyme and what a pleasure it was to watch them try. Vyle handled this impressively, consistently pulling out clever rhymes that felt like they belonged in an actual Seuss book (or its drag queen version, at least). Yaas brought big characters, physical comedy, some ukulele playing and puppeteering. They kept the story moving hilariously even when the rhyme scheme faltered. Tyffanie Morgan later joins in and completely abandons rhyming and it is absolutely hilarious.
From there, the plot zigzags in typical improv fashion. We start under a single coconut tree, somewhere someone falls in love with a singing cat, and somehow Nestlé’s bottled water monopoly enters the conversation. By the time we make it to the celebrity graveyard, very few people, Vyle and Yaas included, even seem to remember where we started.
This show works because of Vyle and Yaas’ comedic chemistry. They are both so good at building on each other’s ideas and turning ‘mistakes’ into running jokes. The audience is a real part of the process too, throwing in suggestions and reacting in real time.
By the end, I was laughing as hard as anyone else in the room. The sheer creativity was extremely enjoyable. As Yaas mentioned, it is drag queens doing improv. Every night is a new show so neither I, Yaas, nor Vyle know what the next show will bring but if the last one was anything to go by, expect a sharp, funny hour. This is one to catch while you can.
‘A Play We Just Wrote – Just Now’ plays until today, August 16, 2025 at the Baby Grand in the TK Fringe as part of The Kick & Push Festival. More information about the show and tickets can be found here.
