The Fiascoholics bring their new dramedy, 4’s a Crowd, to Edinburgh Fringe this month.
“Ever wondered what happens when a LadBible-loving geezer, a pretentious C-List actor, a sadomasochist Wotsit-lover and an overbearing faux-liberal billionaire get thrown under the supervision of a Welsh boy-scout leader in one confined space after a catastrophic nuclear war?
4’s a Crowd is a new comedy play that follows the idiots left behind after the world ends.”
Where: Theatre 1 at theSpace @ Surgeons’ Hall
When: 18 – 23 Aug
Ticket link: https://www.edfringe.com/tickets/whats-on/4-s-a-crowd-or-what-not-to-do-when-stuck-in-a-bunker-during-the-apocalypse
The team tell us more about their debut show, and plans to become Fringe regulars!
4’s A Crowd is set during a nuclear war. What inspired it and what’s it all about?
Well, in today’s world, nuclear war is definitely a more relevant topic than we’d like it to be… And conveniently, it’s also the perfect setting for a pressure-cooker comedy!
There is literally nowhere for the characters to escape to, and so when constructing a 50-minute Fringe play set in one time and one space, it seemed like a very fitting location!
The show is about a group of five survivors stuck in a bunker after a world-ending nuclear catastrophe, with only enough supplies for four of them.
Faced with the impossible decision of who to throw out, it’s fair to say the situation is a bit of a nightmare.
What’s more, these people are five of the most ridiculous, unbearable idiots to exist, and the Welsh boy-scout leader put in charge has much more enthusiasm than brains!
The play satirises the fact that the only people who could afford to survive the apocalypse would be the exact sort of people you wouldn’t want to rebuild society.
They’re selfish, totally un-self-aware, and completely morally bankrupt!
Why should audiences come to your show, and what might they expect?
Fundamentally, we want the audience to have a good time!
The biggest aim with our writing, and our main goal as a theatrical troupe, is to revive a genre of beat-driven silliness.
We feel that a lot of mainstream comedy tends to sacrifice absurdity to try and seem more ‘relatable’, and our show tries to rally against that thought process.Â
The content might be bleak but the characters are utterly ridiculous, which brings it into a genre that we feel is unique and underexplored.
We like describing it as a ‘buckaroo’ – the gags pile up as quickly as the dramatic tension – before something explodes! It feels like the inmates have taken over the asylum. It’s quite manic.
When it comes down to it, our show is a farcical comedy – we just want the audience to have a laugh for an hour!
How did you make a start in the business?
This is actually our debut play as a theatre company!
But in terms of meeting each other, Tomi (Fry) and Todd (Bell) met in the West End cast of Billy Elliot the Musical, becoming friends since eleven years old… and Max (Burton) had a dog named Billy – not directly related but we feel it’s relevant.
We then all ended up going to the same school for a few years and bonded over our love of silly comedy – we love writing and consuming absurd sketches at every opportunity!
After college, we parted ways to study different sectors of creative education. Tomi is currently studying acting, Todd studied writing, and Max studied directing, so that worked out well!
The goal has always been to form a theatre company together, and the Fringe is the perfect way to start.
What does Edinburgh Fringe mean to you?
The Fringe really has been our biggest aspiration since we left school. And after a few years of clashing timetables and impossible financial barriers, it is absolutely incredible to finally make this dream come true.
It’s the biggest theatre festival in the world and we want to learn as much as we can from being a part of it.
We’ve been lucky enough to have visited the Edinburgh Fringe during the last few years, sometimes as part of other productions, but the idea of taking our own work up, seeing the audience’s reaction and developing the show in real time is beyond exciting!
We really will welcome the critiques just as much as the compliments!Â
What’s next for the show?
On a base level, we’re looking to use our time in Edinburgh to develop the play just as much as showcase it.
Hearing which parts the audiences love most will allow us to improve the show in real time, tweaking and refining it as we go along.
From there, the sky’s the limit! We’re aiming to come back to the Edinburgh Fringe every single year from 2025 onwards, and the current plan is to bring a new show every year.
We want to build an audience as The Fiascoholics, and to be known for the specific comedic vibe we bring to theatre.
However, if the love is there and the demand is high, we would absolutely love to bring this show back in the future!