Club Dramaturgty: Massaoke @ Edfringe 2017

MASSAOKE: CLUB LA LA is every Thurs-Sun 23.45 at the Spiegeltent Palais Du Variete in Assembly George Square Garden for tickets go to www.edfringe.com

What was the inspiration for this performance?

There’s a long history of people getting together in a room, drinking, dancing and having a proper singsong together. In the old days it used to be round a piano in a pub but Massaoke is basically a modern take on a very old fashioned idea.

Is performance still a good space for the public discussion of ideas? 

Well the world is an increasingly scary place so generally I think performance is becoming a more important space for the discussion of ideas than it has been for some time.

Massaoke however, is probably more of a experience where people come to let their hair down, forget about the stresses of the world and have fun. In a mad world I think people come to escape.

How did you become interested in making performance?

I’ve been an attention hog since I first played an angel in a school nativity and then progressed onto music when I formed a band aged 13.

The entire band have been involved in music and/or acting since a young age (Mark our keyboard player even appeared in Shakespeare with Benefict Cumberbatch during his schooldays).

Only Ethan, our visuals operator is new to performing - but he’s taken being a VJ to a whole new level of fabulousness you’ll never see anywhere else!

Is there any particular approach to the making of the show?

The first priority is always picking a great set of songs that people know, can sing and love in equal measure. From there everything else falls right into place.

Does the show fit with your usual productions?

Club La La is a bigger, better, bolder version of Massaoke. Expect giant balloons, glitter, sequins, amazing medleys, our rocking live band and DJ sets and some new Massaoke hits combined with our old favourites and of course, our amazing new venue the Spiegeltent Palais Du Variete in Assembly George Square Gardens which is nothing short of magical!

What do you hope that the audience will experience?

Joy, fun, camaraderie, euphoria 

What strategies did you consider towards shaping this audience experience?

Over the past few years we’ve been doing Massaoke we’ve developed ways to ensure the audience are having a great time, it is mostly down to song choice and just a bit of encouragement, but one of the key elements is also that we have fun too - once the crowd knows we’re having a great time it makes them feel more relaxed about having a great time themselves.

It's Mayhem

I have seen a few shows, but I have had far more in the radio studio. In fact, I intend to spend the rest of the Fringe in the studio, making episodes of Subcity of the Fringe, only leaving to buy Chinese food and alcohol.

After the first day of recording, I am not sure I could pick out a mere top five - listen to the show and see who sounds friendly - but I had fun listening to Bob Slayer's outrageous life stories, was charmed by Clout Theatre (Lecoq gags ahoy) and was astonished by Christine Bovill's versions of Piaf's signature songs. However, I want to take a moment to remember a show that I saw before it came to the Fringe, and I know is lurking outside of the studio, somewhere in Summerhall.

Puppet. Book of Splendour is not something to slip into between comedy shows: stands ups might pretend to be soulful, but against the depth of feeling in Puppet, they'd ruin your appetite. Based around the Book of Job, with added caballa, it is a journey through the life of Polish theatre legend Kantor, with added angels in afro wigs and the darkest projections onto the darkest set. Astonishing, frightening and life affirming (as long as that live can accept a God beyond understanding), it's the kind of theatrical mayhem I adore.

Summerhall, 8 -13 August 2012

While I am on the mayhem tip, let's go for the Wau Waus. They have a new show - naked as they day they were born, apparently - and are in La Clique Royale. The Waus Waus once said that they chase the moment where everything is falling apart, when the act is on the edge of collapse: they have certainly smashed most of the boundaries that keep cabaret and performance art apart. Their erotic strategies are inspired by a punk ethos and a feminist intelligence, and they usually upset somebody by the end of the Fringe.

The Famous Spiegel Tent, 8- 26 August

Since I am now sitting in Dance Base, I reckon bANGER is worth a shout. It's Very Metal, a one woman take on the pleasures of being a young male, stuck in the bedroom and playing the games that always come along when the volume goes up to eleven. Warfare, rockin' out, a glance at the way a youth's mind can follow the beat into fantastic worlds. I am outside the studio as it is being performed right now, and it made my hair grow long when the tunes kicked in.

Dance Base, Various Times, 3 - 12

While I am on the Dance Base tip, I did chat to Alan Greig out of GOD (Grumpy Old Dancers) and Gary Clarke (A Beautiful Hell). It's a typical smart Dance Base double bill that does something original with pairing up distinctive masculine works. GOD works through the hilarious mismatch of the dancers (Greig does the camp, Andy Howett is the most macho man ever to front a Gaelic TV show about dance). Gary Clarke's choreography grows beauty from brutality and, after last years's solo, has pulled together a group of young dancers to flesh out his energetic, passionate vision of a life lived at full tilt.

Dance Base, Various Times, 3 - 12


So - there are my predictions for the most chaotic (but watchable shows), short of the car crashes and the big Polish action pieces in the Quad (I'll be getting to them soon). But, of course, the real mayhem is on the Royal Mile where I am doing my one man show Get Out of My Way, I Don't Want a Flyer. The bit where I punch a nun was described by the police as the most shocking moment you'll see all year: sadly, they didn't give me five stars but a five year suspended sentence.