Category Archives: Plus 3 2017 – Features

All our features from the 2017 festivals.

+3 Interview: Lost in Translation: A Bilingual Journey

Posted in *Written Interviews, EdFestivals 2017, Plus 3 2017 - Features by

“I first started at The BBC Comedy Venue as a runner and then I came back every summer as a performer or producer.”

WHO: Marion Geoffray, Performer/deviser

WHAT: “What happens in the mind of a bilingual person? Lose yourself in a joyful and intimate journey celebrating languages, cliches and pop culture. Interactive and thought-provoking: a performance like no other, pushing and questioning both theatrical and European frontiers.”

WHERE: Institut français d’Ecosse (Venue 134)

WHEN: 16:00 (60 min)

MORE: Click Here!

Is this your first time to Edinburgh?

I’ve been doing the Fringe ever since I moved to the UK almost 9 years ago. I first started at The BBC Comedy Venue as a runner and then I came back every summer as a performer or producer. It is the first time though that my theatre company Theatre Sans Accents presents its own production so it is a bit like the first time all over again 🙂

Tell us about your show.

Lost in Translation: A Bilingual Journey is a co-devised piece based on true life events created by Marcus Bazley (the director) and myself, it is produced by Eszter Marsalko.

While I had the ideas for the play in my head all along, making them come to life turned out to be more challenging. We didn’t have a script at first, instead, we just shared anecdotes and created a collage of memories and events in different languages reflecting the different parts of my story. Once we had all those blocks and mood boards, we made a collage and assembled all the pieces of the puzzle together. It was a very organic way process. Marcus and I had worked two years ago on the same production (Theatre Re’s Blind Man’s Song) during the Fringe. We wanted to work together and this was the perfect opportunity as I needed to work with someone who was native yet fluent in French too!

The production had its first preview at Summerhall in April 2017 and then went on to preview in Warwick, London and Hidden Door Festival in Edinburgh where it changed a lot through being presented in front of a the live audience.

This show is a journey so we have intentionally left it open ended as we are hoping to add more “stops” and “chapters” to the story as we tour it to different places. We are planning on bringing it to The Festival d’Avignon next summer and hopefully secure dates in the UK this winter.

What should your audience see at the festivals after they’ve seen your show?

Younger audiences should definitely check out The Wonderful World of Lapin (Le Petit Monde) and Gobland for Goblins.

For us older people: – Palmyra by Fellswoop Theatre / – Extra-Curricular and Brite Theater’s Richard III – a one-woman show.

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+3 Interview: AnimAlphabet the Musical

Posted in *Written Interviews, EdFestivals 2017, Plus 3 2017 - Features by

“Many of the families return to watch the show again. It’s lovely to see familiar faces in the audience.”

WHO: Jake Addley, Actor

WHAT: “Treble Clef Island is a wonderful land of music, song and dance, but there’s a problem. Calando the Dastardly Duck has escaped and is threatening to steal sound forever. Join Colin the Cockatoo on a quest to find the island animals and thwart Calando’s plans. A waltzing elephant, a reggae frog, a Geordie jazz giraffe and a hip-hop donkey are just some of the musical-misfits Cockatoo will meet along the way. With an island full of bright characters, bold puppets and unforgettably catchy songs, written by The Hoosiers, it’s a family musical unlike any other.”

WHERE: Pleasance Dome (Venue 23) ​

WHEN: 10:30 (60 min)

MORE: Click Here!

Is this your first time to Edinburgh?

This is my fourth time performing at the Fringe. My first performance was in 2010 and I returned a year later to perform a one man show called One Fine Day. One Fine Day received excellent reviews and was nominated for The Stage’s Best Solo-Performance Award (Edinburgh Festival 2011).

In 2015 I performed Cross The Shifting Sands, another one man show, and now I’m very excited to be returning to Edinburgh in a brand new family musical called AnimAlphabet the Musical.

Tell us about your show.

AnimAlphabet The Musical is the creation of Al and Sam of The Hoosiers and Mark Hooper and Dean Penn. Al and Sam wrote the music and lyrics and the story was created by Mark and Dean.

It’s such a fun show, the songs are brilliant, each character has their own unique musical style. The show has lots of humour that appeals to all ages. We’ve performed to children from 15 months to over 80 and it has something for everyone to enjoy throughout the show. Many of the families return to watch the show again. It’s lovely to see familiar faces in the audience.

AnimAlphabet premiered at South Hill Park In July. Over 450 people came to watch and the audiences reaction was incredible. More recently (last weekend) we performed to thousands of children and families at Camp Bestival in Dorset and that was a fantastic experience. What next? We are taking AnimAlphabet on tour to a number of UK venues and there are plans to take the show back out on tour in 2018.

AnimAlphabet The Musical is produced by Hit The Mark Theatre.

What should your audience see at the festivals after they’ve seen your show?

Come see AnimAlphabet and then, maybe, come see it again. After that Gruffalo’s Child for families, The Nature of Forgetting is a fantastic show, Merrily We Roll Along, and Lula Del Ray by Manual Cinema.

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+3 Interview: Jon and Nath Like to Party

Posted in *Written Interviews, EdFestivals 2017, Plus 3 2017 - Features by

“We premiered this at last year’s Camden Fringe, refined it for Brighton Fringe, then refined the shit out of it for Edinburgh.”

WHO: Jon Levene & Nathan Lang, Performers/producers

WHAT: “Fresh from a sell-out Brighton Fringe run, a mischievous new sketch comedy show from best friends who can’t stand each other – Jon Levene and Nathan Lang. Action-packed sketch, crackling satire, outrageous impressions and hardcore physical comedy – including the hottest (and possibly only) Jehovah’s Witness act in town. It’s time to learn how Jon and Nath Like to Party!”

WHERE: Laughing Horse @ The Free Sisters (Venue 272)

WHEN: 13:30 (55 min)

MORE: Click Here!

Is this your first time to Edinburgh?

This is our first Ed Fringe together as Jon & Nath, although we have been up before individually. So for the purposes of this question, yes… and no. We can’t wait for the full festival experience, which includes Jon slapping Nath really hard onstage approximately 50 times. We’ll be sharing a tiny room with our Techie DJ Henry, and possibly a single bed (the description was confusing). It’s been a long road – literally – as we’ve planned this since meeting at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival.

Tell us about your show.

We are the writers, performers, producers (mainly Nath as Jon can’t spell) and special effects designers (which is obvious when you see our robot sketch). After relocating from Australia to the UK we spent a lot of time producing video sketches for our YouTube channel before writing our first live show in years.

We premiered this at last year’s Camden Fringe, refined it for Brighton Fringe, then refined the shit out of it for Edinburgh. After Edinburgh we’ll book more UK festivals before translating it into French to hit the continent and all French-speaking countries in Africa.

What should your audience see at the festivals after they’ve seen your show?

We recommend you come back for Nath’s solo show The Stuntman (16-27 Aug, 1.30pm @ The Free Sisters) – it’s a surreal physical comedy show about a complete idiot (Nath used Jon for inspiration) told through clowning, characters, physical comedy and real onstage stunts.

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+3 Interview: Yvette

Posted in *Written Interviews, EdFestivals 2017, Plus 3 2017 - Features by

“I want people who have been through what I went through to be inspired by the show to reclaim their lives and rise from it.”

WHO: Urielle Klein-Mekongo, Writer / Performer

WHAT: “‘I see the way that butters-fat-lipped-troll-Patrice looks at him, she’s the kinda lighty that finks she’s too nice.’ Evie is thirteen and lives in Neasden with her Mum. She wants to tell us something… her crush on Lewis, trying to be a woman, friends, virginity, garage remixes… an ‘uncle’ lurking in the corner of her story. She wants to make us laugh, she’s pretty good at it. She wants to tell us something, but she daren’t let it out. A one-woman show with original music about stolen childhood and growing up with a secret. Based on a true story.”

WHERE: Pleasance Courtyard (Venue 33) ​

WHEN: 14:15 (60 min)

MORE: Click Here!

Is this your first time to Edinburgh?

This is my first time in Edinburgh and at The Fringe!

Tell us about your show.

Yvette is a one-woman show, with original music, that tells the story of Evie. Evie is thirteen and lives in Neasden with her Mum. She wants to tell us about something – her crush on Lewis, trying to be a woman, friends, virginity, lightys, garage remixes… and an ‘Uncle’ who lurks in the corners of her story.

I wrote Yvette whilst I was still studying at East 15. It was selected to be presented at DEBUT Festival and subsequently went on to win the Young Harts Writing Fest Audience Favourite, the Kings Head Theatre Stella Wilkie Award and The East15 Pulse Award 2017. It was also at this time that China Plate came on board as the producers and I started working with Director, Rebecca Atkinson-Lord to help elevate the show to it’s next stage of development. The show has been previewed as part of Hull City of Culture 2017, Pulse Festival and The Albany.

I’m incredibly excited to have the opportunity to present the show at the Edinburgh Fringe. Yvette is inspired by my own experiences as a teenager and it was a difficult piece to write. I think I wanted to write myself to a place of healing, but soon figured that I couldn’t. What I actually needed to write was the truth about where I was at. I want people who have been through what I went through to be inspired by the show to reclaim their lives and rise from it.

We hope that this is just the start of the journey for Yvette and aim to tour the show in 2018.

What should your audience see at the festivals after they’ve seen your show?

I’m looking forward to catching ‘offiside’ in the pleasance above, written by leading spoken word artists Sabrina Mahfouz and Hollie McNish. I’m Huge fan of both there works n fact Sabrina Mahfouz a mentor of mine, I relate to the honesty of her writing style and I’ve heard great things!

I also look forward to catching Leaf and Buzz both East 15 Alumni shows coming from the BA Acting & Contemporary theatre course. They’re both great shows that I have seen but I look forward to seeing how further they have developed since.

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+3 Interview: Our Man in Havana

Posted in *Written Interviews, EdFestivals 2017, Plus 3 2017 - Features by

“It seems fitting that the city where some of us met is where we are returning with our debut show. “

WHO:  Ollie Norton-Smith, Director

WHAT: “Havana, Cuba! A Cold War world of suspicion, suspense and silliness. Amidst the sultry and seductive climes of Havana our heroes twirl, twitch and tango away from enemy agents, MI6 and the truth. Jim Wormold, a run-of-the-mill vacuum cleaner salesman turned accidental spy, resorts to fabricating ludicrous military reports in order to save his business and satisfy his decadent daughter, beginning a hilarious and improbable rise to the top of the British Secret Service. This fast-paced physical farce of peril, espionage and vacuum cleaners will leave you gasping for breath and an ice-cold daiquiri.”

WHERE: Pleasance Courtyard (Venue 33) 

WHEN: 13:00 (60 min)

MORE: Click Here!

Is this your first time to Edinburgh?

No it is not! As graduates of Young Pleasance, the Pleasance’s youth theatre company, we have all visited and performed at the Fringe over the last 4 years. Edinburgh is a city we love and which some of us have family in, which, in combination with our shared love of the Fringe, means it is a city very close to our hearts. We are particularly excited to be returning with a new company of our own, though, and are champing at the bit for the festival to start.

Tell us about your show.

As a company we were brought together through Young Pleasance, and are performing this year under the XYP initiative. As a company aged 18-21 we likely wouldn’t have met were it not for performing with Young Pleasance in Edinburgh.

It seems fitting that the city where some of us met is where we are returning with our debut show. Our show is a new adaptation of Graham Greene famous novel Our Man In Havana adapted by myself and one of the actors, Hamish Lloyd Barnes. A fast-paced physical farce of espionage, suspicion and vacuum cleaners, ‘Our Man In Havana’ is a fun, silly and family-friendly show.

What should your audience see at the festivals after they’ve seen your show?

We are enormous fans of Gecko and they are a huge inspiration to us in terms of their journey as a company and the physical theatre style they employ. We have been looking forward to seeing The Dreamer for months and can’t wait to do so on our day off. They are consistently one of the classiest acts on the fringe and I have no doubt this year will be no different.

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+3 Interview: The B*easts

Posted in *Written Interviews, EdFestivals 2017, Plus 3 2017 - Features by

“It is about time I came up to perform in the Fringe – and pretty shameful that I never have before!”

WHO: Monica Dolan, Tessa

WHAT: “Setting the modern obsession with putting your own child first against our responsibility as a society towards children as a whole, this dark tale, written by and starring BAFTA award-winning actress Monica Dolan (W1A, Appropriate Adult, The Witness For The Prosecution), explores how far one mum will go to give her child what she wants. A searing exploration of the pornification of our culture and the sexualisation of our children. Directed by John Hoggarth.”

WHERE: Underbelly, Cowgate (Venue 61) 

WHEN: 18:00 (60 min)

MORE: Click Here!

Is this your first time to Edinburgh?

It’s my first time performing at the Edinburgh Fringe, but I have visited and performed in Edinburgh before at various theatres. I played Laura in The Glass Menagerie at the Edinburgh Lyceum in Polly Teale’s production nearly twenty years ago (one of my favourite jobs). It was over Christmas and New Year and a terrific time to be in the city. I also toured to the Traverse with a play called Sliding With Suzanne with Max Stafford-Clark and Out of Joint, and was in Edinburgh with Shared Experience’s Jane Eyre in 2006. So it is about time I came up to perform in the Fringe – and pretty shameful that I never have before!

Tell us about your show.

My solo show The B*easts is having its premiere at the Fringe. I wrote it and am also the sole performer but am lucky enough to have a supportive team around me. My producer is Suzanna Rosenthal for Something For The Weekend, and the show is directed by John Hoggarth and designed by James Button.

I had already written the show, and sent it to Suzanna who wanted to do it and around the same time I read it to John and James who I have known from other jobs for years, and who were keen to get on board with the piece too.

The show is about sexualisation of culture and specifically children, and is a storytelling piece. I haven’t thought beyond doing The B*easts at the Edinburgh Fringe, but am open to anything that comes from performing here, and the play has lately been published by Samuel French, so there will hopefully be a future for it with other performers too.

What should your audience see at the festivals after they’ve seen your show?

Showstoppers the Improvised Musical definitely – you will need it after my show! The Hero Who Overslept is a Gilded Balloon show about Climate Change that I think will be worth catching, also Education, Education, Education at the Pleasance Dome, and Richard Gadd: Monkey See, Monkey Do.

Comedy-wise: Sara Pascoe, Richard Herring, Reginald D Hunter, Focus On: Lola and Jo and Max and Ivan: The Reunion are some to aim to catch, I think.

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+3 Interview: What Would Cathy Do?

Posted in *Written Interviews, EdFestivals 2017, Plus 3 2017 - Features by

“What really pleases me about the play is that audience come to completely different conclusions about Cathy that are both valid.”

WHO: Chris Aronsten, Writer and Director

WHAT: “Cathy’s just been thrown out of the supermarket for stealing, but she’s not a junkie, and she’ll kill any c*nt who says she is. Because she’s an actress, OK? Rehearsing for a film role. Living the life of her character. Taking notes, making observations – and when the cameras start rolling, she’s going to give the performance of a lifetime. Just as long as she’s still around.”

WHERE: C venues – C primo (Venue 41) 

WHEN: 14:55 (30 min)

MORE: Click Here!

Is this your first time to Edinburgh?

Yes, this is my first time at the Fringe as a participant or an audience member. We‘re touring the show quite bit this year, including two shows back at home in Sydney and two solo theatre festivals in the US. But the Edinburgh Fringe is definitely the highlight for us, with 26 performances scheduled.

Tell us about your show.

I created by theatre company 40 Watt Pearl as a way of producing my own work, because I got tired of waiting for “permission” from others to get certain plays up. I’m not really a career director, but I do enjoy directing my own work, and in the case of “What would Cathy do?”, I’m also the producer and composer… A combination of love and necessity! Next stop for the play is the United Solo festival on Broadway in November.

What would Cathy do? tells the story of Cathy, who bursts onto the stage in the first scene looking for all intents and purposes like a junkie in decline. But Cathy says she’s not a junkie at all, she’s an actor, deeply immersed in a character she is creating for an up-coming feature film. At first, this explanation has the ring of truth about it. But the more desperate she becomes to convince us, the more unsure we become about where the real truth lies. Is she a method actor irretrievably lost inside the character she says she will portray, or a real life drug addict at the end of a tragic decline? What really pleases me about the play is that audience come to completely different conclusions about Cathy that are both valid.

What should your audience see at the festivals after they’ve seen your show?

I’m still exploring the festival myself, but I’m travelling with a very talented bunch of Aussies, who are also performing monologues. I can highly recommend Misterman, a brilliant 80 minute monologue by Enda Walsh, Good With Maps, by Australian writer Noelle Janaczewska, and my friend Tom Campbell’s hilarious stand up show One Hander (Tom only had one hand….)

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+3 Interview: Cold Fronts and Hot Flushes: The Short Stories of Kevin Spacey

Posted in *Written Interviews, EdFestivals 2017, Plus 3 2017 - Features by

“Both of our cast members are completely new to Edinburgh as well, which will hopefully be a fantastic experience for them.”

WHO: Qasim Salam, Producer

WHAT: “A ghostwriter and his best friend work tirelessly to create the greatest book ever written. A book of short stories about love, religion, friendship and spiders. Except, they didn’t write a single word. Kevin Spacey wrote it. Kevin Spacey wrote everything.”

WHERE:  Greenside @ Infirmary Street (Venue 236)

WHEN: Varies (60 min)

MORE: Click Here!

Is this your first time to Edinburgh?

This is Buttered Toast’s Fringe debut which is ridiculously exciting (and totally unexpected) considering we didn’t even exist this time last year. Both of our cast members are completely new to Edinburgh as well, which will hopefully be a fantastic experience for them.

Our directors are members of the Durham Revue sketch troupe so have a couple Fringes under their belt, whilst I’ve been hooked on Fringe since I first went in 2013 and haven’t missed one since doing a bunch of different things! It is my first time producing a Fringe show though, so that’s been a completely different build up to the Festival. I’ll actually be relieved to get there!

Tell us about your show.

Cold Fronts and Hot Flushes is the brainchild of Durham Revue regular and resident comedic powerhouse Andrew Shires. The storytelling comedy premiered at the Durham Drama Festival, where it took home 4 awards after a sell-out run. The play follows a ghostwriter as he takes on his greatest challenge yet: to write a book of short stories commissioned by Kevin Spacey. However, once his flatmate finds out, they both get sidetracked by the fantastical tales, and the play goes from quirky to utterly bizarre as they embark on a journey through the creative mind of Mr. Spacey, featuring the second coming of Jesus, friendly spiders and a porn-obsessed rural women’s association.

Buttered Toast produce the show, and were formed last November to provide a practice platform for aspiring young writers in the North East. We hold regular showcases in a speakeasy bar and arts space in Durham, which feature short new plays and extracts from longer pieces, as well as a mixture of stand up, sketch, music and spoken word.

We like to work with writers over a longer period of time, giving them the time, space and facilities to hone and practice their work. We also have a very relaxed atmosphere, and keeping a touch of silliness and fun with everything we do is important to us – which is why Cold Fronts and Hot Flushes is such a great debut show for us!

What should your audience see at the festivals after they’ve seen your show?

Ooooh there are oh so many! As a clown, I would definitely head straight over to the big guns Sam Simmons and Trygve Wakenshaw if you haven’t seen them already. Zach and Viggo are a brilliant clown duo who also both have their own one man shows, Tom Walker is fab too, and I am particularly excited about Laid by Natalie Palamides which is directed by the legendary Doctor Brown.

Our pals the Pretend Men do some great silly stuff, and now they are set IN SPACE. For sketch I’d say look no further than Aunty Donna, the Australian madmen, or Gein’s Family Giftshop. Sorry that’s quite a few, I could keep going but I’ll stop there for everyone’s sanity!

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+3 Interview: Tense Vagina: an actual diagnosis

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“I’m bringing my two kids, husband, my mother, 25 dildos, a host of weird props and 150 t-shirts that say, Sara Juli’s: Tense Vagina: an actual diagnosis. Please buy one, no really, please.”

WHO: Sara Juli, Creator/Performer

WHAT: “Using humour, movement, song and the audience, Sara Juli reveals all that is awesome and all that sucks when it comes to being a mother. Tense Vagina is a show about the beauty, challenges, isolation and influence motherhood has on the human experience. Focusing on the taboo aspects of motherhood: loneliness, tears and dildos, the hilarious narrative is anchored in the physical therapy Juli received at the Pelvic Floor Rehab Center of New England for urinary incontinence.”

WHERE: Underbelly, Cowgate (Venue 61)

WHEN: 16:10 (60 min)

MORE: Click Here!

Is this your first time to Edinburgh?

This is my first time at Edinburgh Fringe Festival and I honestly have no idea what to expect. I’m bringing my two kids, husband, my mother, 25 dildos, a host of weird props and 150 t-shirts that say, Sara Juli’s: Tense Vagina: an actual diagnosis. Please buy one, no really, please.

There has been a lot to navigate detail wise, but I’m thrilled to be bringing the show to the Fringe and to get the run going. 22 shows in 25 days is certainly a first for me. I’m curious to see how the show will shift and change over the course of a long-run. I also really enjoy making people laugh. This piece is hilarious, but not just funny hilarious, it’s the kind of hilarious where we’re getting at something underneath, and we’re experiencing it together. Plus, I give away free snacks, so audiences literally have nothing to lose…

Tell us about your show.

I created, “Tense Vagina: an actual diagnosis” a few years ago in my small NY City apartment, when I was attached to a hospital-grade breast pump and couldn’t move. The one- woman show, produced by Underbelly, uses a lot of humor, movement, song, and text to peel a layer back and reveal all that is awesome and all that sucks when it comes to being a mother.

It’s not a classical “ode-to-motherhood” show that pulls from traditional themes around the beauty of being a mother, but rather focuses on the parts of motherhood that are taboo such as: loss of bladder control, copious tears, extreme loneliness, monotony and dildos, to name a few.

The narrative is anchored in sharing the physical therapy I received at The Pelvic Floor Rehabilitation Center of New England. It sheds light on the embarrassment and humor from the treatment of my post-childbirth urinary incontinence. The show has a bit of something for everyone: song, stand-up comedy, free snacks, karaoke, dildos, and an uninterrupted hour to think about your own or someone else’s vagina. I have an 11 city US tour planned for the 2017-2018 season that I’m super excited about.

My dream after the Fringe is to continue to perform the work. I’m really proud of the piece.

What should your audience see at the festivals after they’ve seen your show?

Manuel Cinema (Lula Del Ray) and Fleabag. I’m also interested in taking my kids to Trash Test Dummies.

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+3 Interview: Replay

Posted in *Written Interviews, EdFestivals 2017, Plus 3 2017 - Features by

“It’s been a great ride since the last time I was here last and I’m really excited to see what audiences make of my second play.”

WHO: Nicola Wren, Writer and Performer

WHAT: “Replay. When a fiercely independent, workaholic police officer finds herself on the street where her brother once lived, she is propelled back to her vibrant childhood and forced to confront a tremendous loss. Replay is an intimate, funny and moving new monologue, written by Nicola Wren (501 Things I Do in My Bedroom) and brought to you by Edinburgh Fringe favourites DugOut Theatre (Swansong, The Sunset Five and Inheritance Blues).”

WHERE: Pleasance Courtyard (Venue 33) ​

WHEN: 14:15 (60 min)

MORE: Click Here!

Is this your first time to Edinburgh?

This is my second year at the fringe, I was first up in 2015 with my first play, 501 Things I Do In My Bedroom in which I also performed. It was then that I met DugOut Theatre who I am now working with on Replay. It’s been a great ride since the last time I was here last and I’m really excited to see what audiences make of my second play.

Tell us about your show.

Replay is the story of an uptight police officer who, the day before her interview for sergeant, receives an old tape that her brother recorded for her made for her years ago. This tape causes her world to unravel as she revisits her childhood and confronts the tragic loss of her brother. It’s a moving, funny and uplifting story about loss and acceptance.

DugOut Theatre are producing and their Artistic Director, George Chilcott, is directing. George and I met two years ago in Edinburgh and decided to work together last November. We premiered the play at the Hen & Chickens Theatre in London for a week and, following the success of that, we decided to bring it to the fringe with a view to securing a longer run in London later this year or early next.

What should your audience see at the festivals after they’ve seen your show?

Goodbear – a hilarious sketch comedy duo with a theatrical twist. DIGS – a devised show about shared living by brilliant company Theatre With Legs, comedy trio Muriel Comedy with their first show, Bad Master and Trygve vs a Baby which is sure to be a brilliant and hysterical mime show from the best of the best. There are so, so many more. I can’t wait to discover all sorts of wonderful new shows.

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