Edinburgh Moment: Meeting Other Performers
In Mad About the Boy a father and a man struggle over what is best for a little boy, who has his own ideas of what to do next. The play by Gbolahan Obisesan, winner of the Jerwood Award 2009, is directed by Ria Parry, winner of the Leverhulme Director’s Bursary 2010 and a Fringe First Award in 2009, who shares a memory of her Fringe debut.
I took my first show up to Edinburgh when I was 19 with some friends from University. We worked incredibly hard to get our show up to the festival and worked endlessly to get ourselves noticed. It was a serious business. One of our props was a set of legs in a suitcase. They stole the show during the moment a character’s missing legs were finally discovered. Brought the house down and told the most essential part of the story. No legs, no show. On day four our suitcase disappeared from the store room. We were devastated. We spent the whole morning making calls, calling meetings, causing chaos, sending press releases – STOLEN LEGS. Teary eyed and having gone public with our theft we returned to the venue just before our next performance, devastated, cursing Edinburgh, ready to cancel. We walked in to the store room and there was our suitcase, legs inside with a note from the comedy show that followed ours saying ‘Sorry, we took your legs instead of our pants. Love ya x’
Mad About the Boy is on at Udderbelly’s Pasture from 3-29 August (excl 16) at 14.20.
