Monica Hsueh on Resilience, Migration and Stand-Up in London

NOVA ESEA
2 days ago
5 min read

Taiwanese comedian Monica Hsueh is not interested in a cool, detached persona. On stage, she is open, chatty and a little bit chaotic in the best way, the kind of comic who remembers audience members from the last show and checks in on them mid‑set. Her debut hour, How to Be a Strong Woman in One Hour, feels less like a lecture on resilience and more like being invited into her living room.

From kitchen banter to the mic

The starting point was almost a dare. During lockdown, Monica’s husband watched her riff, complain and crack jokes around the house and finally said what many partners have thought but rarely say out loud:

“How did I start? Oh, it was my husband’s idea… he said, please can you take this energy somewhere else? And I did.”

So she did. She signed up for an open‑mic, wrote a short set and stepped onto a tiny stage. Performing stand‑up for the first time is nerve‑racking for anyone; doing it in a second language adds another weight on your shoulders. But the laughs landed. That first taste was enough to keep her coming back.

Stand‑up quickly became more than a hobby. It gave Monica a new way to process her life, stories about growing up in Taiwan, moving countries, family expectations, awkward jobs and the way people project ideas of “strong Asian woman” onto her. The show that emerged from those stories would eventually become How to Be a Strong Woman in One Hour.

Owning the label “strong woman”

The title started as a joke and a provocation. Monica noticed how often people described her as tough or resilient, sometimes as praise, sometimes as a way of brushing past what she had actually gone through.

“Everyone has always told me that I’m a strong woman… so I thought, why not have a straightforward title: How to be a strong woman in one hour?”

On the surface, it sounds like a self‑help seminar. In reality, the show gently pulls that idea apart. Monica talks about childhood, work, dating, migration and the quiet pressures that build up over time. The stories are specific to her, but the feelings, wanting to be seen beyond stereotypes, trying to live up to multiple expectations at once, land across the room.

On stage she is playful and self‑aware. She leans into the title, promising the audience they will leave “stronger”, while also poking fun at the idea that anyone can teach you how to fix your life in sixty minutes. The strength the show celebrates is more honest: the ability to be vulnerable, to laugh at yourself, and to keep going even when things feel overwhelming.

Comedy as a second language

English is not Monica’s first language, and she is upfront about that in her material. Rather than trying to hide it, she uses it as a source of jokes and connection — misheard phrases, cultural misunderstandings, the mental gymnastics of translating a punchline on the fly.

Writing and performing in a second language forces her to be precise. Every word has to earn its place. It also makes her deeply tuned in to the audience; she is constantly watching faces, adjusting rhythm, and choosing whether to explain a reference or let people catch up.

That awareness extends to how she talks about identity. Monica is a woman of colour in a comedy scene that is still largely male and white. She does not present herself as a spokesperson, but her stories inevitably push back against narrow ideas of what an “Asian woman” on stage should be like, quiet, submissive, grateful. Instead, she is loud, silly, stubborn and proudly herself.

A show that feels like a conversation

One of the most distinctive parts of How to Be a Strong Woman in One Hour is how interactive it feels. Monica is constantly talking to the crowd, picking up on tiny details — a facial expression, a nervous laugh — and folding them back into her set.

“I encourage them to ask me questions towards the end… I want them to feel like they are talking to a friend.”

The Q&A section near the end of the show can go in any direction: people ask about her family, her move to the UK, even for advice. Sometimes the questions are heartfelt, sometimes they are wonderfully odd. Monica treats them all with the same mix of curiosity and mischief, answering honestly while still finding a punchline.

That willingness to open up makes the room feel safe. Audience members see someone being candid about fear, shame and confusion and turning those moments into jokes. It is hard not to relax when the person on stage is clearly on your side.

Laughing to move forward

At the heart of Monica’s comedy is a simple philosophy about how to survive hard things.

“You have two choices — either you cry about it or you laugh about it. I choose to laugh so you can get over it and move on.”

She is not saying that pain is funny, or that people should just “lighten up”. Instead, she talks about humour as a way of loosening the grip of something heavy. If you can find a joke in a difficult memory, it becomes a little easier to carry.

That approach has shaped how she sees herself. Stand‑up has been a crash course in self‑confidence: learning to back her own instincts, trust her writing, and accept that not every night will be perfect. When a joke fails, she treats it as data, not a disaster. When a new bit sings, she stores the feeling and builds from there.

Influences and what’s next

Ask Monica about her favourite comedian and she answers without hesitation.

“My favourite comedian is Sean Lock… you feel like it’s him, and he goes into his imagination a lot — that really inspires me.”

What she loves most is that sense of honesty: the feeling that you are seeing the real person on stage, not a manufactured character. It is something she is working towards in her own shows — fewer defences, more truth, even when that truth is strange or embarrassing.

Recently, Monica reached a new milestone: making it to the BBC New Comedy Award semi‑finals on TV.

“It’s exciting, and I know I worked really hard for it.”

Whether she is in a small fringe room or on a national broadcast, the aim stays the same: to make people feel less alone and give them permission to laugh at the parts of life that usually stay hidden.