Tag Archives: LOVE+

EdFringe Talk: Love, Loss and Chianti

Posted in *Written Interviews, EdFestivals 2022 by

“There are surprises on the Fringe everywhere you look, an intensive, packed experience which reminds even the most diehard box-set viewer of the pleasures of live performance.”

WHO: Robert Bathurst

WHAT: “Robert Bathurst (Cold Feet, Downton Abbey, Toast of London) stars alongside Rebecca Johnson (The Trip, The Flood) in this heart-breaking and hilarious double-bill of love and loss, written by Costa Book of The Year Award-winner Christopher Reid and directed by Jason Morell. Intertwined with glorious animations from cartoonist Charles Peattie, Reid’s A Scattering and The Song of Lunch are brought to life in this critically acclaimed production.”

WHERE: Assembly Rooms – Music Hall (Venue 20) 

WHEN: 12:55 (95 min)

MORE: Click Here!

Is this your first time to Edinburgh?

This is my sixth Edinburgh as an actor and the second time bringing my own show. It’s a great place to try out something unusual – audiences are up for it. There are surprises on the Fringe everywhere you look, an intensive, packed experience which reminds even the most diehard box-set viewer of the pleasures of live performance.

What are the big things you’ve learned since 2019 and have you absorbed any of the lessons yet?

Don’t always believe what you hear. Question everything.

Tell us about your show.

I’ve taken two books by the poet Christopher Reid and adapted them for theatre using 90 minutes of brilliant cartoon animation. Rebecca Johnson and I perform. I’ve been developing the show for ten years – animation takes time – and have loved collecting a great team, including co-producers Assembly Productions and Something For The Weekend; everyone has patiently stuck with me.

We tried out one half – the funny half – of Love Loss & Chianti in Edinburgh in 2018 and launched the whole show in London in March 2020. We lost everything, like so many others, and have regrouped to do it here. It’s so exciting to be doing this material again.

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

For slam-dunk guaranteed entertainment and breathtaking skill it has to be the Showstoppers improv gang. I’m also looking forward to Baxter vs The Bookies – I love horseracing; Tim Vine, I surrender to him completely Frank Skinner, I’m devoted to his poetry podcast and loved his book on standup; Basil Brush’s Family Fun Show, probably the hit of the festival; Debussy At Teatime, what could be better?; Arthur Smith, he’s a listed monument, the funniest one I’ve seen; Ghosts Of The Near Future, looks like a wild ride; and Tim Key, with whom I spent a night in Kuala Lumpur.

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+3 Interview: LOVE+ and BlackCatfishMusketeer

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

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“Our double-bill brings sex, technology, and sex with technology to this year’s festival.”

WHO: Breffni Holahan, Performer and Producer

WHAT: “You meet someone online. All you know is their name and that they seem to like you as much as you like them. In fact, you think you love each other. But do you? Can you? What even is love, anyway? Maybe we not only don’t know, we can’t know; we can only know what love isn’t. So, let’s say what it isn’t. BlackCatfishMusketeer doesn’t look like the internet, but it feels like it. It’s about trust, doubt, closeness at a distance, and being worried you’ll die alone and cats will eat you. #BlackCatfish

“What happens to romance when there’s a machine who cooks for you, cleans for you, never forgets your birthday or how you like your tea, tells you you’re beautiful, holds you when you’re crying, and still makes you cum? Love+ is a one-woman two-hander about the inevitability of human/robot relationships. It’s about loving, being loved, being human and whether those things are intertwined. It’s not about whether or not you can love machines, because we all already do. It’s about what it’ll be like when they love us back. #Loveplus”

WHERE: Summerhall (Venue 26) ​

WHEN: 19:10 (60 min)

MORE: Click Here!

Is this your first time to Edinburgh?

This will be our first time presenting in Edinburgh.

By the end of 2017, we will have produced 3 shows in as many years at Dublin Fringe, so thought we’d take two of those shows over to EdFringe and see if audiences there like them as much as our wonderful Dublin audiences.

We’ve visited the festival before and always had a ball, but participating as artists is a whole other beast. We’re pretty nervous, but we’re mostly very excited to meet new audiences and start new conversations.

Tell us about your show.

Our collective, MALAPROP Theatre, is presenting two shows at Summerhall. LOVE+ and BlackCatfishMusketeer will both make their international debuts as part of EdFringe ’17, and will alternate in rep..

Our double-bill brings sex, technology, and sex with technology to this year’s festival. While both shows are very different in terms of form and content, they are both told with a measured balance of wit and insight into The Now.

Our debut production, LOVE+, was a stand-out hit of Dublin Fringe 2015. It is a one-woman two-hander about the inevitability of human/robot relationships. It’s all about what happens when (not if!) the machines we all already love so much start loving us back.

Our second show, BlackCatfishMusketeer, was nominated for Best New Play at Dublin Fringe 2016. It is a play about online dating and being afraid you’ll die alone and cats will eat you. It gives us an insight into how the Internet (a character in the play) might feel about how we use it.

MALAPROP is a Dublin-based theatre collective that aims to challenge, delight, and speak to the world we live in (even when imagining different ones). Other work includes JERICHO (Bewley’s Café Theatre commission 2017) and Everything Not Saved (to premiere at Dublin Fringe 2017).

We hope to show those who come along to our double-bill a good time. Hopefully we’ll leave people with a chuckle and a few thought-kernels that make them go “Hmm” the next day. We’re also looking forward to seeing what opportunities lie ahead for the shows and for MALAPROP. We’re young and hungry and welcome The Future in a big way.

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

On your way out of LOVE+, you should definitely consider coming back to us for BlackCatfishMusketeer the following evening (or vice versa, of course)!

Cheekiness aside, we’d recommend checking out Culture Ireland’s programme at this year’s festival. We’ve seen the other shows they’re sending over and they’re total hits and we’re very proud to be considered in their league. Our must-see would be Oona Doherty’s Hope Hunt at Dance Base. She’s so cool and so talented and we’d like to be her, please.

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