Baby Brain is currently on tour and will be stopping off at Greater Manchester, Camden, and Edinburgh Fringes this summer/
“A new play about motherhood, postpartum psychosis and stand-up comedy! A new mother, Cass, tackles her mental health crisis, with dark humour, bright wit, brutal honesty and dreams of becoming a comic. A “slightly true story”, starring BAFTA winner Kimberley Nixon (Channel 4’s Fresh Meat). “
Where: Studio Three at Assembly George Square Studios
When: 21-30 Aug
Ticket link: https://www.edfringe.com/tickets/whats-on/baby-brain
What can you tell us about your show? What is it about and where did the idea come from?
Baby Brain is about a hairdresser called Cass who wants to be a stand-up comedian. She’s just had a baby. She’s been admitted to a Mother and Baby Unit because she’s suffering from postpartum psychosis. She’s decided the best way through her ordeal is to practice her open-mic set. Trying to laugh and make sense of it all, as her sanity crumbles around her.
The whole project came from my own life, sideways. After I had my first baby, I had perinatal OCD, including devastating intrusive thoughts. I started talking about it online, then with other mums, and the thing that kept surprising me was how funny those conversations were.
Not in spite of how dark it got. Because of it. I took that to Tim & Danny (the co-writer/directors), who I’d worked with before, and they helped me build a play out of it. So, in the end, Cass isn’t me. Her story is a lot of mums’ stories. But she also knows what I know.
How would you sell it to audiences in one paragraph?
It’s a one-woman show about postpartum psychosis that is genuinely, properly funny, and then, when you’re not looking, it takes the legs out from under you. Hilarity and heartbreak flip like switches. There are gags about cervixes and sourdough and Graham Norton. There’s also the truth about what happens to some women’s minds after they give birth. But we’ve tried to make all of this as entertaining, accessible, and challenging as possible, so anyone can see and enjoy the play, not just mums. Hey, you’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll watch me literally lose my mind.
Do you enjoy participating in the Fringe? And do you have any moments you particularly remember?
Ask me on the 31st of August, and you’ll get a more honest answer. I love it, and it terrifies me, which is roughly the correct response to the Fringe. The moment I keep coming back to isn’t from Edinburgh, it’s from our world premiere at Porter’s in Cardiff. We sold out, added a show on the night. I got stage fright because a load of mums from my school run turned up. But at the end, men and women I’d never met were coming up to tell me their version of the story. That’s when I knew the play had something beyond what I had initially hoped – something bigger and deeper that was hitting just as hard as all the jokes.
What are you looking forward to the most in Edinburgh?
Watching a room of strangers realise they’re allowed to laugh at this. There’s a specific moment, every show, where someone laughs at something they think they shouldn’t, then looks around, then relaxes. I’m collecting those. And I can’t wait to experience the rest of the Fringe, of course. Other people’s shows, the cranky weather, the Royal Mile, handing out my leaflets, the amazing buzz – all the glorious chaos that Edinburgh throws at you in August.
What’s next for the show?
We’ve got the rest of the tour first, Poole, Greater Manchester Fringe, Camden Fringe, then Edinburgh Fringe (Assembly) from the 21st to the 30th of August. After that, we’d very much like to bring it to London, and some lovely conversations are happening that I’m too superstitious to say what they are out loud. But the plan is for Baby Brain to keep going. Cass has waited a long time for an audience. I’m not taking the mic away from her yet.