“It’s been so freeing taking a few weeks off post-festival. There were maybe three months before the Edinburgh Fringe where I was having these exam stress-related dreams.” Before heading to Scotland for the world’s largest performing arts festival this summer, comedian Chloe Petts was keenly aware of the pressures to follow up on her sell-out debut show Transience, especially as she had never before written a show in such a short amount of time. Even in her first week at the Fringe, Petts wasn’t sure that her new show, If You Can’t Say Anything Nice, was totally ready. Even worse, she was feeling hormonal.

“It’s not something we talk about enough: women being on their period in the comedy world. That feeling where you think everyone hates you? Imagine that feeling but on a stage in front of 150 people!” That first week, Petts was stressed and lacking in confidence. However, as soon as her period ended, the fog lifted and she could see things more clearly. “I just decided to stop saying the bits of the show that I thought were bad, and then the show was much better.”

The comedian now has a rule that if she’s on her period, she doesn’t perform new material. “It’s a very vulnerable experience anyway so when you add hormones on top of that, it can be quite demoralising,” she explains.

Selling out most nights of its run in Edinburgh, If You Can’t Say Anything Nice was met with critical acclaim, and Petts is now taking the show to Soho Theatre in London. During Transience’s initial run in 2022, Petts was widely praised for exploring the fraught subject of gender identity in a friendly, “palatable” way, addressing subjects including gender fluidity, male privilege and toxic masculinity through the lens of her own experiences. “I wanted to write a show about being a masculine woman and how that’s puts me into funny situations in the world.”

Yet Petts is disheartened and angry that transphobia seems to be getting worse in the UK (in the year ending March 2023, hate crimes targeting trans people hit an all-time high, with even the Home Office acknowledging that comments by politicians and the media over the past year may have contributed to this rise). “I just thought to myself: why did I spend all this time trying to be polite when it doesn’t feel as though society is even listening? Why should I moderate my tone when people aren’t moderating theirs?” Petts says. “So I decided I was just going to be pissed off.” If You Can’t Say Anything Nice sees the comedian delve into her darker side while chatting about everything from Greta Thunberg and Millwall to Queen Elizabeth II.

Petts may come across as cool and confident on stage, but nerves can still creep in. “The worst thing playing on my mind [before debuting If You Can’t Say Anything Nice] was feeling like I could humiliate myself,” she says. Acceptance is key, however, and she decided to just make the show she wanted to make. “When you’re having fun and people can see and feel that, that’s when the whole room starts to have a good time.”

For Petts, comedy has never been about trying to emulate other comics, but figuring out what she finds funny while staying true to herself. While her teenage years were packed with shows like the Vicar Of Dibley, Miranda and Outnumbered, it was her family who motivated her. “I was always the funny one, but then I was the least funny at home because my family are hilarious,” she says. When she was 18, her music teacher suggested that she give stand-up comedy a go. Petts was unsure, but the thought played on her mind over the next couple of years.

At university, she went down the drama route and wanted to be seen as a “serious actor”. Always “desperate to be a performer”, she was constantly doing something creative, taking steps towards making that dream a reality. But comedy was still on her mind, and so Petts signed up for her first stand-up gig in Kentish Town, packing the room with all her friends. “I crushed it like I’ve never crushed it before,” she remembers. “But then [at] my second gig, I completely tanked it.”

She adds: “Sometimes you have a good gig and sometimes you have a terrible one. It can be both soul-destroying and life-affirming and I carried on doing it, and thank god I did because I love it.”

Like many other industries, comedy hasn’t always been too welcoming towards women. But Petts thinks things are starting to move in the right direction, with more women seeing comedy as a viable option for them. “The main issue is that stand-up is still only accessible to people with money,” she says. “So I’d love to see more championing of working-class comedians, similar to how the comedy circuit used to be in the 80s – a playground for the working class.”

If You Can’t Say Anything Nice will be Petts’ third solo run at Soho Theatre and the comedian is excited to get back on stage – so much so that she’s her own support act. “I go on and do around 25 minutes of crowd work at the beginning; I love it,” she says. “It gives me an insight into what the audience is like on the night – some of the stories they have! – and it informs the show in a different way. Every show is truly different.”

If You Can’t Say Anything Nice is at Soho Theatre in London from 30 October-4 November, before a nationwide tour. For more information and tickets, visit chloepetts.org

Images: Matt Stronge