Edinburgh Fringe 2024
Cabin Fever
Fresh !ink Theatre Company
Genre: Comedy, New Writing, Theatre
Venue: theSpace @ Surgeons' Hall
Festival: Edinburgh Fringe
Low Down
Belt up for this two hander that explores the vagaries associated with plonking random people next to each other in an alloy tube at 30,000 feet. Expect unexpected friendships and in-flight shenanigans in equal measure in this delightfully scripted and performed piece of comedy theatre. The sky really is the limit!
Review
Working the queue for the eleven hour flight from Heathrow to Los Angeles, the two meet and greeters are in full-on adenoidal tonal mode with just that whiff of insincere intonation so redolent of the aircraft boarding experience. But at least I won’t be sitting next to the passenger from hell. I always turn left when I board an airplane. Sorry, what’s that? You’ve overbooked and my seat is already taken? You want me to fly back there? With the prols?
And what an eclectic mix of people we have on board today. The inveterate snob forced to slum it down the back of the plane; the understated overachiever; the stressed out executive; the over familiar (in this case) therapist; the couple for whom boarding the aircraft is an adventure in itself; the single mother with the kid that whacks you in the back by kicking your seat and gurns the entire time; the family who’s pre-teen offspring could start a fight in an empty room. The list is endless. And don’t even get me started on the cabin crew. All aboard then, for eleven hours of pure purgatory.
Written and performed by Aurelia Harris-Johnstone and Beth Miles, this is an alarmingly accurate, laugh out loud creation that’s as much an anthropological study as it is a piece of comedy theatre. Imaginatively staged and consummately delivered, the duo have focused on keeping it simple, like most good theatre. The set is two seats (obviously in economy class) under each of which is a box of props that are used to great effect to aid character differentiation. That’s it, apart from some cleverly scripted announcements to keep us updated as we hit cruising altitude.
So begins fifty minutes of exquisite duologues between just the sort of people you’d just love to spend eleven hours sitting next to. Not. Richard, the stressed out executive, sitting apart from his wife due to demand for seats, paired with Anastasia, nominally a therapist but more like a seductress on heat. Richard’s wife, that inveterate snob forced to slum it in economy, one never likely to let silence reign for a nano-second, who just happens to be seated next to a school friend she hasn’t seen in years. The bewildered older couple on a holiday to celebrate a special anniversary, grappling with the complexities of aircraft toilets and entertainment systems. The self-obsessed social media duo so interested in posing and posting that they fail to see that real life is passing them by.
Each of the aforementioned characters, and the many others played by this impressive duo, is impeccably curated. The way each of their respective persona sits or stands; their accent; their mannerisms. Switching between each is seamless and looks effortless but must have taken a lot of rehearsal, given the frequency with which we flip across the duologues.
It looks a bit like a flurry of short (some very short) sketches. But it’s actually a lot more than that. Throwaway lines are plot signers for later in the show. Relationships develop and unravel in subtle, sometimes quite poignant ways. And what seem at first sight to be quite separate character duologues often aren’t, as the intricate, superbly crafted (and delivered) script is full of twists, turns and surprising depth.
Ordinarily I would have had no hesitation in recommending you see the show. Highly recommending, in fact, as it’s an exquisitely scripted and delivered piece of theatre capturing the quintessential elements of the passenger(s) from hell. Given a free choice, I would book it in as a “must see” show, one of our highest accolades.
However, there’s no point. These guys should have chartered a much, much bigger aircraft to meet the demand for seats. Every seat was sold before the first scheduled flight even took off. And it’s too late to to arrange any unscheduled ones. So it’s Ryanair for you lot I’m afraid.
Harris-Johnstone, Miles and their new venture, Fresh !Ink Theatre Company are one’s to really watch out for. Few sell out a Fringe run before their run starts. Even fewer do it with their debut production. The sky really is the limit for this pair of supremely talented writer/performers.
