Festival Previews Video Blog

Today in our spotlight falls on John Dumnot, actor and co-writer of the Children’s show, The Sun Dragon which takes place at the Pleasance Courtyard throughout the duration of the Fringe. Starting daily at 12.45 pm John is joined by four fellow actors to take children on an intergalactic fairy tail journey following the adventures of Jacob who dreams of flying. So let’s learn more about John and their show, The Sun Dragon….

1. What inspired you to become a performer and writer?

Donald O’Connor singing “Make ‘em laugh” in Singin’ in the Rain and Orson Welles, who played Unicron in Transformers the Movie.

2. What is your show about and what should the public expect from your show at the 2008 Edinburgh Festival Fringe?

The Sun Dragon is a magical fairytale about a boy who has to travel to another world to rescue their Sun from a dragon, with the help and hindrance of the planet’s inhabitants who range from the wise, to the nasty, to the very, very, silly.
The public should expect magic and fun and to enjoy themselves a lot more than they expected to.

3. What are your funniest and worst experiences performing in front of an audience?

Excuse the length of this anecdote, but it was a series of mishaps that shaped the whole comedy of this experience: I was in a production of the Mysteries and needed the loo. So I asked a fellow player if I had time and they said yes so off I dashed. Taking off my Shepherds hat and very warm jacket on the way. When I got back (in quick time I might add) I discovered that the other two shepherds had just gone on with their sheep in tow. So I grab my jacket, throw it on, grab my hat, and grab the packet of Cherry Bakewells that I had to pull from my trousers to offer as a gift to baby Jesus. As you do.

So I run into the hall, it was an en promenade performance, catch up my shephards, kicking a sheep in the face as I went, and continued to try and get my rather stubborn jacket on, as it seemed that I had put my arm into the lining rather than the sleeve. All the while my packet of Cherry Bakewells were retreating further and further down my trousers.

We were now on our stage and I’d given up with the jacket, forcing my arm through with a sickening tearing noise and slapping my cap onto my head finally. I then waddled over to baby Jesus, with my Cherry Bakewells now below my knee in the horribly ill-fitting trousers that I’d been costumed in and proceeded to delve into my trousers a little bit too deep to be in entirely good taste and handed Jesus some Bakewells. It got a good laugh.

My worst experience was the time we were booked to do a short vignette from the children’s puppet play we were performing up at the Fringe that year at a Midnight Cabaret. The act before us was a stripper, the act after us a man singing about his penis. They loved it. As did I actually, maybe this is the best?

4. What was the last Fringe or Festival you performed at and what was it like?

Last years Fringe, it was very wet, but very enjoyable.

5. What’s your best advice for aspiring performers in your theatrical medium?

Take the audience on a ride, include them in everything, it is all about them.

6. Are there any dreams or goals that you have yet to fulfill?

I’d like to write something that is loved by everyone. Which is impossible, but aim high I guess.

7. What is the best advice you have ever been given? And did you follow it?

In my schools leavers book my drama teacher wrote “Rum-diddle-de-de, an actor’s life for thee.” Until that point I didn’t know what the hell to do, but I find it impossible not to obey anything that starts “Rum-diddle-de-de”.

8. What is the best book or books you have read and why do you like them?

Catch 22 for it’s sense of humour, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest for it’s characters and implementation of message and themes, Dracula for the way the narrative unfolds, Treasure Island for it’s adventure, and The Little Prince for it’s innocent charm.

9. Who is the person you most admire and why?

Woody Allen, because I love a well constructed joke, and he’s the master.

10. If you could change one thing about the world what would it be?

I’d shuffle the wealth about a bit, I guess. Put more into the advancement of the human race and less into the advancement of the running shoe; that sort of thing.

Today our spotlight falls on the absolutely fabi dabi, Bunny Galore! International octogenarian Bunny Galore is a classy act! Bunny is on at the Zoo Southside venue, Nicolson Street throughout the festival. Her one woman show, Bunny Galore LIVE AND SEDATED looks a treat to see, so let’s chat with Bunny, International Showgirl, Cabaret artist and Queen of the Flamingo Lounge to find out lots more about her and her show…

1. What inspired you to become an international star?

Well darlings, its hard to say when one had ones calling to la stage was….. but the old Drury Lane theatre had just burnt down and London was ablaze with talk of the latest thing, oranges!

2. What is your show about and what should the public expect from your show at the 2008 Edinburgh Festival Fringe?

It’s me becoming downloadable and blogging with the good people of this fair city. My roller coaster of a life through funny stories and songs! Plus there’s a guest appearance from my days of children’s television presenting and clips from my films and TV shows and my soap opera “Pantry Manor”.

3. What are your funniest and worst experiences performing in front of an audience?

Well I used to entertain the troops in Soho during the war, with an electric fan and wearing only feathers, slowly the fan would blow them off, although I never went all the way of coarse!… till one night a doodlebug had just gone off in Leicester square, and there was a power surge and sudden WOOOOOSSSH!!!
I lost the lot!

4. What was the last Fringe or Festival you performed at and what was it like?

Does the opening of The Crystal Palace count? …….No! Ok then this is my very very first festival! I’m so excited! I did come up last year to see my friend Faith Brown in her show BOYS IN THE BUFF purely to be supportive of coarse!

5. What’s your best advice for aspiring performers in your theatrical medium?

Always keep your hand on your penny! And never close your teeth when you smile.

6. Are there any dreams or goals that you have yet to fulfill?

Maybe to resist the plastic surgeons knife for a little longer…….

7. What is the best advice you have ever been given? And did you follow it?

As Mandy Rice Davis told me always get the money before removing any items of clothing!

8. What is the best book you have read and why do you like it?

Probable my autobiography “LOOK AT ME!!!”

9. Who is the person you most admire and why?

Well my absolute touch stone is still the one and only Diana Dors!

10. If you could change one thing about the world what would it be?

That they should make the watching of episodes of Noele Gordon in Crossroads compulsory.

Today our spotlight falls on the award-winning slight-of-hand magician and illusionist, Eric Walton. A proud denizen of New York, Eric is performing his one man show Esoterica which is set to mesmerize audiences at the Edinburgh Fringe. His show is on at the Underbelly, Baby Belly throughout the festival and looks a fascinating show to see. First let’s find out about Eric and his show…

1. What inspired you to become a writer, actor, sleight of hand artist, raconteur, winning entertainer whom critics have compared to as Oscar Wilde, Vincent Price and the devil himself?

The short answer is that I enjoy performing more than I enjoy anything else. I studied theater in high-school and thought, “This is it. This is what I want to do.“So when I was nineteen, I packed my bags and moved to New York City and have been there ever since.

Then about eight years ago, I saw my first card trick and it changed everything for me. I began to study magic every day and then I got the idea that I should incorporate magic and theater and my other interests, such as philosophy, metaphysics, language and psychology, into a show. So I started writing and eventually came up with ‘Esoterica.’

2. What is your show about and what should the public expect from your show at the 2008 Edinburgh Festival Fringe?

‘Esoterica’ is really a show about ideas; big ideas, like perception, destiny, memory, deceit, psychic phenomena and so on. People should expect, above all else, to have a really good time. For all its academic trappings, ‘Esoterica’ is a very funny, very ironic and dry show. This is of course not just my opinion. This is according to first-hand accounts of actual audience members whose credibility is beyond reproach.

3. What are your funniest and worst experiences performing in front of an audience?

Earlier this year, I was doing a show at the Brighton Festival Fringe in which I would begin the program by running onto the stage, grabbing the mic and then introducing the show with this carnival/side-show banter. One night, in front of a sold-out house of 400 people, I ran onto the stage and when I got to the mic-stand, I stepped on a rhine-stone and fell flat on my back. The mic-stand hit me right in the eye on my way down and it was swollen for a few days after. Some of the performers from a show called ‘The Tom Tom Club’ had been in the audience and the following night I saw them in the green-room and they said they really liked my entrance and that they had discussed maybe doing something similar. And they were serious. Apparently the whole thing looked staged. I told them that as far I knew, falling flat on your back was in the public domain and they were welcome to it.

4. What was the last Fringe or Festival you performed at and what was it like?

As mentioned, I just did the Brighton Fringe and it was a amazing. Great crowds, great shows, lots of energy and some very tasty chips after the show.

5. What’s your best advice for aspiring performers in your theatrical medium?

Get thee to a nunnery. And by ‘nunnery’, I mean ’stage.’ Performers need time on stage, in front of an audience and the more you do it, the better you’ll become at it. And you should practice all the time. Also, if you have a boyfriend or girlfriend or spouse who discourages you from being a performer, you should either break up with or divorce him or her.

6. Are there any dreams or goals that you have yet to fulfill?

Thankfully, yes!

7. What is the best advice you have ever been given? And did you follow it?

I don’t generally solicit advice and when it’s offered, I do my best to ignore it,
but the best advice I ever got was, “Impunitas semper ad deteriora invitat.” It’s Latin. I had to look it up and now so do you!

8. What is the best book you have read and why do you like it?

‘Thus Spoke Zarathustra‘ by Nietzche is a great book. It fits in your pocket and is chock-full of insight into the nature of humanity.

9. Who is the person you most admire and why?

Baruch Spinoza was a total bad-ass. He was smart, courageous and independent.I wouldn’t have been able to spar with him, that’s for sure.

10. If you could change one thing about the world what would it be?

Besides the levels of atmospheric CO2, I would change the levels of atmospheric religious dogmatism that threaten to louse everything up for the rest of us. If you must believe in god, please do it without blowing things up!

We love to turn our web pages over to customers who have great stories to tell. In the process of setting up Esoterica’s Virtual Flyer, Fiona Fletcher sent me her article, Burlesque and Bin Men. I loved it immediately and had to share it with you. Enjoy!

Burlesque and Bin Men
By Fiona Fletcher/Fletch Productions

In September 2007 I began researching 2 very different ways to make a living in New York City – performing on the Burlesque/Variety Circuit and throwing trash. I was in the early stages of producing 2 x 30 minute programmes for an American Broadcaster in which an MTV presenter would be taken from his plush NY studio to spend a weeks training in a different profession.

Born and bred in Lancashire, my understanding of Cabaret/Variety shows had been moulded around evenings spent in working men’s clubs with my grandparents watching Chorley’s hottest ventriloquists and Elvis impersonators, coupled with stories of Les Dennis (the early years) being boo-ed so badly at Wigan working men’s club that he had to climb out of a window in his dressing room to make a hasty retreat. Suffice to say, since leaving Lancashire, watching Cabaret/Variety shows as a form of entertainment has never been high on my agenda. Burlesque had also been filed under ‘AVOID’ based on trashy documentaries on Living TV and a Burlesque (bordering on porn) evening I’d attended in 2006.

Cut to early November in New York, and having spent a pretty cold and stinky week hanging off the back of a garbage truck bombing through Greenwich Village at stupid o’clock in the morning, I was looking forward to spending the following week in the warmth of The Cutting Room, Chris Noth’s off-Braodway club that hosts ‘Le Scandal’ – and although I knew it would be an easier week and more up my street than collecting garbage, I was still slightly cautious that I was about to embark on an experience that was somewhere in between the closing credits for Pheonix Nights and Spearmint Rhino.

Within an hour of the first day of filming I discovered how wrong I was to judge Variety based on working men’s clubs and how ignorant I’d been about Burlesque.

What I experienced on the New York Variety scene in the week that followed completely opened my eyes to whole new world of entertainment, an underground world of weird and wonderful burlesque, variety & circus performers. Stunning, sophisticated, highly- trained, edgy and hilarious burlesque, variety & circus performers. Having spent 6 years as a bass-player and having experienced some the best nights of my life gigging and hanging out on the Camden gig circuit in the late 90s – I was pretty much convinced that music was my only one true source of entertainment…until I visited the late night haunts of NYC’s variety circuit. A heady mix of burlesque acts, aerialists, contortionists, magicians, showgirls, trick-ropers and cool DJs coupled with stories of a-list celebs buying tables in dark corners at 5000 dollars a pop had me hooked.

I sat on the plane on the way home and thought about setting up my own entertainment/events company, I desperately wanted to bring New York to the UK, I wanted to give people a taste of my experience in New York and wanted to give people a source of entertainment that mixed edgy performers with gob-smacking acts and great music. What was to stop me? I’d had experience of working in theatre, tons of experience of organising gig-nights with cutting edge bands, 8 years experience of budgeting, managing, producing and directing huge live events for TV? What was to stop me? CASH…that old chestnut…

I got back to the UK and I begged, stole and borrowed until I raised enough cash to set up my own company Fletch Productions, and in January this year I embarked on my first project as a limited company – to Produce New York’s Le Scandal at Brighton Fringe.

With the permission of the Producer of ‘Le Scandal’ in New York, I tailored the show for a UK audience and after further research into the performers on the NYC variety circuit, numerous hours staring into the eyes of my trusty friend youtube and 2 further trips to New York, I hand-picked 9 US performers, created a UK based 4-piece gyspy-punk, honky-tonk piano-sing-a-long covers band called The Gents and married them up with 4 glamorous showgirls to welcome guests at front of house and hand out Kazoos to Gents enthusiasts. The performers were a mixture of circus, burlesque and variety and the band covered tracks from Kylie to Nirvana, Talking Heads to Dolly Parton, The White Stripes to Hot Chip, Elvis to Britney Spears. The show was booked by Udderbelly for a 14 night run in the cow at Brighton Fringe this May and the response was phenomenal, word of mouth spread quickly throughout the run, which lead to sell-out shows, great reviews and a nomination for ‘Best International Act’ for Lastest 7’s Festival Awards.

At the same time as producing Le Scandal at Brighton Fringe I also produced 2 one-man shows with 2 of the Le Scandal performers called ‘Esoterica’ and ‘Marcus Monroe – extreme juggler and comedian’ both of which received great reviews with Eric Walton also being picked out as one of the highlight acts of Le Scandal.

Re-reading this, I’ve made setting up a business sound pretty easy, but the truth is, it’s been a very rocky ride. I’ve experienced all kinds of horrendous situations and scenerios, from a recommended accountant seriously ripping me off, to being advised by a top London Law Firm to “sack the whole project off as there’s no way the performers will be allowed into the country”, to my appointed PR “company” turning out to be a one-woman band who I paid £3k to do nothing but go on holiday for 2 weeks before the shows, to cast members going AWOL because they’ve taken to “making out” with each other as opposed to rehearsing and to losing large sums of cash in the process.

However, after the enormous challenge of setting up a Limited Company, taking 2 casting trips to New York and producing 3 International shows in the space of 4 months and all the stressful nonsense in between, one thing remains at the core of Fletch Productions and that is the desire to search for and provide new & innovative high-end entertainment, the desire to create and direct an event or show that is more than just a magician, a middle-of –the-road jazz band and a character-less girl stripping down to nipple tassels, and the desire to produce shows that really push boundaries. There is nothing more exciting than discovering a performer or show that literally has you gasping in awe or crying with laughter. Whether in Brighton, London, New York or even Lancashire, one thing is for certain - there will always a better source of entertainment out there, and my aim is to search for it, and if I can’t find it II will create it.

Fletch Productions has a number of really exciting shows and events in store for 2008 and 2009 involving artists & musicians from the UK, New York, Australia, Russia & New Zealand including ‘Esoterica’ at Edinburgh Fringe, ‘Burlesque Against Breast Cancer’ – a prestigious charity event taking place at The Old Market/Brighton on 6th November to raise money in aid of Macmillan Cancer Support, ‘The Boy With Tape On His Face’ an award winning one-man show all the way from New Zealand, a new production from our burlesque super-heros from across the pond Trixie Little and the Evil Hate Monkey, a brand new Burlesque/Variety show and numerous bespoke events for private and corporate clients,

Company info

Fletch Productions is a fresh and innovative company focusing on Producing, Managing and Promoting high-end entertainment, productions and events throughout the UK and the US. With 10 years experience of producing Live Entertainment, Music, TV, Photography & Events and working with artists such as Jo Frost, Gordon Ramsay, Jeni Bond, Julian Beever, D-face, Toure, Trixie Little and The Evil Hate Monkey, Fletch offers a top-class service that covers every aspect of any production or event, large or small. Whatever your budget, whatever your style, whether it’s a launch party, private party, corporate event, wedding or civil partnership, Fletch can assist from concept through to completion and anything in between.

Contact: Fiona Fletcher
t: +44 (0) 1273 906286
m: +44 (0) 7869 105265
e: fiona.fletcher@fletchproductions.com
w: http://www.fletchproductions.com
skype: fletch productions

Today we interview the naturally funny Scottish comedian, Janey Godley. Janey is returning the the Edinburgh Fringe with her one-woman stand-up comedy show, Domestic Godley which is on at the Pleasance Dome throughout the duration of the Edinburgh Fringe.

Not just a comedian, Janey writes books plus a weekly column for The Scotsman newspaper. You can dip into her blog, Brave Journal and find out what she up to. So let’s chat to Janey…

1. What inspired you to become a writer, comedian and performer?

I love talking and my show is basically anecdotal, it’s great watching people sitting there listening to your stuff. And you get paid for it!

2. What is your show about and what should the public expect from your show at the 2008 Edinburgh Festival Fringe?

My show is all about how useless I am as a housewife and how women don’t have to be good at much, but just be good at being themselves.. There is too much pressure on women nowadays – we should enjoy being crap at cooking.

3. What are your funniest and worst experiences performing in front of an audience?

The funniest was at a high security prison, where I was doing comedy and most of the inmates knew me personally. It freaked the prison guards out!

The worst was when I nearly fainted in Munich on stage in the middle of a show. It was very hot and I couldn’t breathe – yet my mouth continued with the show despite my brain screaming to let me pass out!

4. What was the last Fringe or Festival you performed at and what was it like?

I recently did the New Zealand Comedy Festival and it was just amazing, I love the Kiwi’s and the shows sold out everywhere. Such an awesome feeling.

5. What’s your best advice for aspiring performers in your theatrical medium?

Get loads of stage time and never assume you know everything. Respect every show and never play to your mates at the back. Comedians can get very lazy and assume they are funny all the time. Audiences deserve to be treated to a good show and it’s your responsibility to make sure they get one.

6. Are there any dreams or goals that you have yet to fulfill?

Yes – I have yet to spend a night with George Clooney and I want to write a movie.

7. What is the best advice you have ever been given? And did you follow it?

My husband told me on my very first gig- “Always leave them wanting more” though how he knew to say that will always amaze me, he was right and I do.

8. What is the best book or books you’ve read and why do you like them?

I love the novels by Kate Atkinson; she is a wonderful writer and paints a picture with words that stay with you till you die.

9. Who is the person you most admire and why?

I admire Joan Rivers, her amazing tenacity in the business will always be an inspiration to me, she is sharp, sassy and such good value.

10. If you could change one thing about the world what would it be?

I would want children to be safe from predators and be allowed to give them the chance to grow up as kids without external worries. So all evil pedophiles and people who abuse kids for financial gain or make them child soldiers would be dealt with quickly and firmly.