Zoë Coombs Marr @ Monkey Barrel

Rarely has a show’s title encapsulated its premise as well as Zoë Coombs Marr’s Every Single Thing in My Whole Entire Life. During a period of depression and suicidal ideation, Coombs Marr tells us, she tried to make a record of everything that had ever happened to her. The ensuing spreadsheet includes hundreds if not thousands of stories, split into tabs for the period in which they took place and the people, places and things they feature. She shares it with us now, via two large TV screens – what follows is a sort of choose-your-own-adventure.

We’re invited to shout out which stories we want to hear, based on their titles as written in the sheet, and using those as a jumping off point we weave our way from incident to incident, from tab to tab. Through it all, Coombs Marr commands the journey to its scripted ending ably and with characteristic ardour (her peppy demeanour will, no doubt, prove a bit much for some reticent Scottish audiences).

The spreadsheet itself makes for surprisingly compelling watching – a sort of light counterpoint to the dark draw of doomscrolling. There’s something soothing too about having life’s mess laid out before you in neat, comprehensible units – in a sea of shows by people with ADHD, this might actually be one which harnesses its traits advantageously.

This is obviously a comedy show borne out of a time of great darkness for Coombs Marr – the same is true of many Fringe hours. She doesn’t belabour her misery though, pausing only briefly to provide the necessary context for the significance of the show to land. That context given, we can appreciate the show as a surprisingly beautiful celebration of life. She holds our faces up to the significant insignificances of our own lives and delivers a data-driven analysis of reasons to keep living.

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Zoë Coombs Marr: Every Single Thing In My Whole Entire Life, Monkey Barrel (MB4), until 25 Aug (not 21), 5pm, and 24 Aug, 7.50pm, £12