Last year, Flavia D'Avila was part of the dynamic Edinburgh company, Tightlaced Theatre. Being a restless soul, she has struck out with a new company for 2012, Frontereiras Theatre Lab, nipped across to join the Laughing Horse Free Fringe and come up with a triple bill that consciously crosses national borders, and copies a menu to bring a taster of short, sharp shows.
"Fronteiras wants to generate dialogue and exchange of knowledge and talent across cultures, and research ways of working towards the creation of multifaceted performance events that contain aesthetic elements of diverse cultures," D'Avila begins. "Hopefully the format of the 3-course taster menu will attract some attention. We have also teamed up with Howies from Waterloo Place and will be distributing vouchers for discounted 3-course dinners with our programmes for people coming to see the show."
The three plays range from Scottish (Heather Irvine’s Lovely Burden is the “main course” play, a comic piece looking at the juxtaposition of how being around old people and waiting for death is much like being single), Australia (Angus Algie's “starter” play, Misguided Tour, the tale of an ex-con who gives nocturnal tours of the old jail where he used to be an inmate) to Norway (Oda Fiskum brings the “dessert”: a quick-paced piece about chains and families and teams and guidelines and coupons and membership cards and making the customer happy and smiling and asking about your day and giving you 20% off on a pastry of your choice if you get a medium sized hot beverage). Yet they are all driven by Fronteiras' commitment to fresh, new writing.
D'Avila picks up the story. "I knew Heather Irvine from university and the first idea for the show was born from a text exchange between the two of us on a quiet day at our respective dayjobs. Heather wanted to write a play about the way we deal with singledom and relationships nowadays and I wanted to help her develop it and then direct it, so I invited Torya and Jasmin, two actresses who I've worked with before, to workshop Heather's ideas and develop the script, which would be our only show."
However, D'Avila's own roving led to an addition to the bill. "I went to Denmark for a couple of weeks to attend a course at the Odin Teatret and I met Oda Fiskum, a brilliant writer from Norway who lives in China. On one of our evenings off, Oda asked me to read some of her short scripts to give her feedback and I immediately claimed Team Player, and thought it would be a good idea to present it as a double bill with the play I was developing with Heather."
Even at this stage, the menu format hadn't been developed "I'm not sure how the idea for the Tasters came about, but I felt the need to add a third short play," she continues. "I sent out a call on the social networks and received a handful of submissions, eventually selecting Angus' Misguided Tour. The cast are mostly actors I've worked with before, apart from Sarah and Mandy, who responded to a casting call for actors with languages and will be performing in Italian and Punjabi respectively."
Despite being a new company at the Fringe, the diversity of cast and crew is hard to beat: D'Avila came to Edinburgh from Brazil, and has worked in London and Milan. But the Fringe is not the end of the company's ambitions. "Amongst the projects we are planning for the future are symposia, artist residencies and a full-scale transcultural show for 2014-15," she promises.
THEATRE TASTERS
by Angus Algie, Heather Irvine and Oda Fiskum. Directed by Flavia D’Avila.
3rd- 12th August 2012. Laughing Horse @ The Phoenix Cellar Bar, venue 146. 12pm (55min) - FREE
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