MICF 2025 Review - HEATHER VALENTINE: TRAIN CAKE Review

David Griffiths reviews Heather Valentine's new show Train Cake as part of the Melbourne International Comedy Festival.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
Okay, well, I'm going to continue our look now at
the Melbourne International Comedy Festival by reviewing Heather Valentine's new
show called a Train Cake. Now, this is a comedy
show with a little bit of a difference. Of course,
over the years at the Comedy Festival, a lot of
people have gone to see a lot of stand up
and things like that, but things have changed a lot

(00:24):
over the years, and this is actually a one woman
comedic play now Here Heather plays a character who is
known as Lucky, although that's not the name that her
grandmother wanted her to go by. But basically, her grandmother

(00:46):
was one of the people involved with the Australian Women's
Weekly Children's Birthday cake cookbook and now Heather has continued, well,
Lucky has continued on that path. After an unfortunate incident,
she has moved away from cake making. However, her life
is changed when a sadistic villain from her past returns

(01:11):
to steal the only things, the only thing that matters
to her, and in exchange wants her to once again
start baking cakes. And this is a show, like I said,
with a real difference because Lucky kind of takes on
the different tropes from action films and things like that,
so we hear like Liam Neeson's favorite speech, famous speech

(01:35):
from Taken that he delivers on the phone that I
will find you, I will kill you speech that there's
nods to like some of Bruce Willis's films as well.
But this is all done as a one woman show,
so a lot of the other characters, including cakes that
come to life, are actually projected up onto the screen

(01:58):
behind Heather as the acts out these scenes. And this
is where I've got to say, for me, this show
has its ups and downs, because the comedy of the
show is absolutely brilliant. It's magnificent. It had been laughing throughout.
The creative characters, especially revolving around the cakes the same

(02:22):
really really well done. They look amazing up on the
big screen, and it's great hearing the voices as well,
Like you know that Heather's done those voices, but yeah,
they're coming through the audio, so it sounds like she's
having conversations with them. The same with the villain as well.
But I don't know whether it was other nights as well,

(02:43):
but unfortunately on the night that I was there, sometimes
what was up on the screen would be a fraction
earlier than Heather's actions. So when there was a fight
sequence or something like that, a cake would be squished
or the reaction to a punch on the screen was

(03:03):
a fraction earlier than what Heather was actually doing. And
I'm sure as the show went on as well, that
would be something that would have sorted itself out. But
it kind of was a little bit jarring on the
night that I was there. But like I said, the
writing of this show and the performance by Heather is
just it's great. It's one of those shows that you

(03:33):
you kind of want to go back and watch again
because you're sure that you've missed things the first time
around and things like that, but there is so much
going on in this show, and you really it's a
credit to Heather what she has managed to do with
this show because it does come together so well with

(03:54):
the different characters, and you kind of wonder how action
films and cakes is going to work, but she does
find a way to do it really, really well. So look,
I know it has finished up at the Comedy Festival
for this year, but I highly recommend if you get
the opportunity to and it comes to a city near you,

(04:17):
or a festival near you, wherever you are around the world,
go and see it. Because nobody does these kinds of
shows the same way as what Heather Valentine does. She
does them remarkably well, and train Cake again just shows
her brilliance at what she does. I can't wait until

(04:37):
the day that she decides to write an animated movie,
or even just a comedy script itself for a film,
because I think we're in for something very very special
when she does that. So look out for Heather Valentine's
train Cake if it comes to a city near you,
and go along and check it out.