Holly Day

Holly Day arrives at the New Burbon Festival as a corporate marketing consultant, brought in to modernize its image and chase sponsorship dollars. Brassy, blunt, and entirely unembarrassed by the theatre world's pretensions, she talks in slogans and quarterly targets, and eyes the awkward, overwhelmed business manager Richard Smith-Jones with unabashed interest.

She's the show's jolt of crass commercial energy dropped into a story otherwise obsessed with art and ego, and Jennifer Irwin plays her without a trace of apology — Holly enjoys being exactly who she is. The comedy comes from how unbothered she remains by the festival's self-seriousness, and how genuinely she seems to like Richard anyway.