Guest Blog: Gwen Coburn: The Tiny Details That Make a Fringe Show Special

The Tiny Details That Make a Fringe Show Special (Or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Craft Store)

A week before my Edinburgh Fringe debut, I’m sitting on my kitchen floor at 10 PM, holding a tiny drill I never thought I’d own, trying to perfect miniature eyeball earrings. This is either an absolutely brilliant idea, or I’ve gotten myself thoroughly lost in the weeds. Who can say?

Let me back up.

It started with a pair of earrings I made for myself—little sculpted eyes with teardrops instead of pearls. Cool, weird, and just unsettling enough to make people do a double-take. My partner called them “great and kind of cursed.” I loved them. They felt like me: a slightly unhinged Johannes Vermeer reference, like if the Girl With. Pearl Earring was also in Pan’s Labyrinth. Pretty, but with an edge that might make you wonder about my life choices. Perfect for a comedian debuting “Sad Girl Songs,” a show with a ballad titled “Thank You For Not Murdering Me,” at EdFringe this year.

When you turn your personality into wearable jewelry, turns out people notice. To my delight, and honestly shock, “where did you get those?” became a regular question. And up in my Fringe-planning lizard-brain, a dangerous thought was born: What if I made hundreds of these to give to my audience?

This is the vibe

Fast-forward through months of ambitious planning and absolutely zero execution. It’s the week before I leave for Edinburgh. My to-do list includes urgent things like “finish UK entry application” “figure out how to ship a disco ball,” and “find ghost costume for guest show” (spoiler: it’s made from the ripped-up fragments of my old wedding dress and panic purchases from the Party City clearance section, a long story for another time).

What do I have for my earring vision? A pile of Sculpey clay, a handful of earring loops, and the slowly dawning realization that I might be in over my head.

Tuesday night, I’m at my kitchen table, surrounded by thirty blank white ovals and a growing sense of dread. I’ve spent precious hours wrestling with the “correct” way to make clay eyes in bulk, and I have nothing to show for it except sore fingers and the knowledge that I should probably be packing, or sending emails, or literally anything on my “actually important” list.

But I’m in so deep. And honestly? I really want to be able to give something meaningful to my audience. (Okay, at this point, let’s be realistic—maybe just some of the audience at my first show.)

This is the moment where past-me would have pushed through until 2 AM, fueled by anxiety, hyper fixation, and stubbornness, only to wake up exhausted and resentful. Instead, I did something revolutionary: I stopped. I ate dinner. I set the eyes aside on my kitchen counter, knocked a couple things off my actually-important list, and got some good sleep.

Here’s what I’ve learned as a touring performer, a person with PTSD, and a human: I can’t sacrifice the things I need to stay well and ready to perform. Food, rest, dog-time, yoga—these aren’t luxuries when I’m about to put my soul on stage every night for three weeks. They’re necessities. My therapist would be so proud.

Me and my tiny drill, getting through this together

The next morning, I gave myself an ultimatum: one hour. If I could get the eyes done in sixty minutes, I’d continue the project. If not, I’d accept my fate and acknowledge that occasionally I have to let an idea go for the greater good. As it happens, I got them done. I didn’t need more time or a better plan—I needed a perspective shift and a tiny drill from the craft store (god bless the weird little things I never knew existed).

Flash to that Tuesday evening: I’m back at my kitchen table, assembling earrings that make my little weird inner child smile. I did make them lean slightly more cute and a tad less deeply disquieting; they are gifts, after all. Twelve more pairs down, then just a quick coat of nail polish and I suddenly had a small pile of handmade keepsakes that somehow capture exactly what I want my show to be: personal, a little strange, and made with real care. I made them because I think there’s magic in the details—the things that aren’t strictly necessary but show you’ve thought about the whole experience. When someone leaves my show with a little pair of eye earrings, I hope they remember not just the jokes or the songs, but the feeling that someone really wanted them to be there.

I mean, tell me these aren’t adorable

The Fringe is full of big gestures—spectacular sets, viral marketing campaigns, celebrity performances. There are thousands of shows! It doesn’t get much bigger than that. But sometimes it’s the little things that stay with you: the handwritten note in the program, the performer who remembers your name, the weird earrings that somehow perfectly capture the vibe of a stranger’s show that made you laugh and maybe cry a little.

I’m really looking forward to sharing my dark feminist show with people, and yes, sharing these ridiculous earrings too. There’s something about finding your people in an audience, the ones who get your specific sort of humor, who appreciate when sweet things can also be strange.

That’s what tiny details are all about: not impressing everyone, just delighting the right someones.

Three days after what I will forever call the “eyeball meltdown,” I got on a plane to Edinburgh with a hockey-bag full of carefully planned chaos—scripts, costumes, a disco ball, and fifteen pairs of handmade eye earrings that may or may not find their way into audience hands. The days since have been filled with everything from tech rehearsals to finding where to buy shampoo (Tesco’s? Boots? I’ll figure it out) but right now I’m going to take a moment, feed my body some dinner, and get some rest. It’s all a part of preparing for Fringe.

Plus, now I own a tiny craft-store drill. And honestly, I already love this thing.

Me and the OG eye earrings hanging out in the Greenside dressing room.