Amanda Knox's 'Cartwheel' Reviewed at Edinburgh Fringe
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- Amanda Knox, 39, debuted her rookie standup show 'Cartwheel' at the Edinburgh Fringe, retelling her story through the lens of new motherhood
- Knox recounts episodes from her 'extremely prolonged and public trauma' while folding children's clothes and maintaining a dialogue with her four-year-old daughter
- Knox plans to tell her kids about her wrongful imprisonment as a Dr Seuss story: 'Knox the fox in a box with locks'
- Knox peppers the account with adroit jokes that earn more rueful smiles than laughs, with the reviewer calling her an inexperienced comedian whose set barely qualifies as a 'show'
- Knox confronts the catch-22 she faces — damned whether she tells her story, profits from it, or stays silent — articulating 'a growing anger' at her treatment and a determination not to be silenced
- The reviewer found the set stirring, respectful to the memory of her murdered roommate, and 'as well judged an effort by Knox to reclaim her awful story as we have any right to expect'
Why it matters: A wrongfully convicted public figure taking the Edinburgh Fringe stage as a debut standup is itself the story, and the reviewer credits Knox with the most well-judged retelling of her ordeal to date — even while conceding her material lands more as rueful smiles than laughs and that classifying it as comedy is a misstep.
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