Review: A Transgender Woman On The Internet, Crying is pretty perfect
Welcome to the internet! A platform to find community beyond the confines of your physical location, to share your music or your latest craft project, and to build each other up when things get hard. Also, a battleground where influencers, micro-celebrities, and all-round drama queens viciously tear each other down at the first hint that someone might be ‘the wrong kind of trans.’ Come on in! Tell us your deepest, darkest traumas.
Of course, most of us are no strangers to this side of the internet, and the world of Cassie Hamilton’s new musical A Transgender Woman On the Internet, Crying (henceforth ATWOTIC) will feel all too familiar. Avis O’Hara, aka @TheDIYDoll, lives a perfect life: fame, generational wealth, and an army of ‘dollmaker’ followers dictating her every move, whether that’s her wardrobe or her next surgery. Corrin Verbeck – ‘Takedown Queen’, radical left influencer, recently perma-banned from Twitter – is determined to topple her. But when their fake friendship evolves into real feelings, Corrin’s plan starts to come apart, and both Avis and Corrin have to reckon with everything they believe about what it means to be the right kind of trans. Filled with hyperpop bangers, trans wrongs, and a terminally online sense of humour, ATWOTIC is nothing short of compulsory viewing for anyone who understands the words ‘microlabel discourse.’
To be entirely transparent, I’ve been waiting for a production of this show since I first heard from it in early 2024, and I was lucky enough to see a concert presentation at Hayes Theatre Co’s Festival of New Works last year. So, needless to say, I was pretty excited to see this new staged version.
Reader, it did not disappoint. Let’s start with the obvious: the music of ATWOTIC will get stuck in your head for the rest of your life, and you’ll be more than happy about it. Hamilton masterfully blends a hyperpop sound with musical theatre storytelling sensibilities, adding in snappy, endlessly quotable lyrics that pack both copious joy and a serious emotional punch. (Also, a song that makes copious use of the Grindr notification sound.) With delicious arrangements by musical director Lillian Hearne, and delivered at literally earth-shaking force in the capable hands of sound designer Em-Jay Dwyer, this show just might feel like the best concert you’ve been to this year.
And as if the theatre being in a literal basement wasn’t immersive enough, the walls of the Old Fitz’s black box stage are splashed with fluorescent graffiti: cat faces, angel wings, and ‘THE FUTURE IS TRANS,’ among other things. Accompanying them is a set constructed entirely of sound equipment and road cases. The effect is part-musical, part-rave, a fitting tribute to the hyperpop genre (fronted by trans artists like 100 gecs and underscores) and online trans culture.
As for the cast, the only word that begins to encompass their talents is one frequently used in the show – four letters, starts with C, you know the one. Playing Avis, writer/lyricist/composer Hamilton brings boundless energy and brilliant comedic delivery, with a genuine emotional side that reminds us of the human beneath Avis’s perfect veneer. Opposite her as Corrin, Blake Appelqvist delivers a deep heart, infinite charisma, and stunning vocals. The chemistry and tension between the two leads is palpable from the moment they meet. Playing a range of other roles, from a depressed DJ to a drama-loving twink, Rosie Rai and Teo Vergara are a dynamic duo for the ages. With Appelqvist, they form something of a three witches situation, plotting Avis’s downfall with delightful campy glee.
That’s right: delightful, camp, gleeful, comedic. Despite what the title may suggest, ATWOTIC is far from being all about crying. In fact, by the end, it’s all about joy. You’ll leave the room feeling uplifted, energised, and just maybe – as I heard from many audience members after the show – converted from musical hater to full-blown theatre kid. The ATWOTIC team have created something truly special, and to experience it for yourself, you can grab your tickets from the Old Fitz Theatre in Sydney until the 11th of April. Blåhaj not optional.
