Edinburgh Fringe 2025
Falling: A Disabled Love Story
Aaron Pang
Genre: Theatre
Venue: Pleasance Bunker 2
Festival: Edinburgh Fringe
Low Down
Sex, lies and disability, Aaron Pang plays with our preconceived ideas and dismantles the “acceptable” disability stories.
Review
Based on writer and performer Aaron Pang’s own experience, Falling: A Disabled Love Story confronts us with our own preconceived ideas of disability, and Aaron Pang talks honestly about life, sex and love after an accident and disability. Or does he? The bold twist to this show is that Pang tells us two stories, one heard a thousand times, the “acceptable” disability story, the “comforting lie”, a feel-good tale of overcoming diversity and finding love. Then we have the story not heard before, more complex, with blurred lines. It’s bold and provocative, and Pang is a highly engaging performer. He points out his “hotness”, beams with confidence, but there is a vulnerability that he allows to be seen, both funny and thought provoking.
In helping him create the “perfect” Tinder profile, Pang asks the audience to vote on two possible descriptions, and two picture, and should he reveal his cane and disability upfront, or should that wait until the date? In asking the audience whether they would swipe right, it was interesting how many claimed they didn’t know what that meant- maybe there are even more lies here? He constructs the perfect image of him, the “acceptable” profile, but meeting always turns out differently. He recounts tedious, (his words), therapy sessions, and talks honestly about paying for sex, especially when younger and his looks aroused more suspicion about his age than his cane. It is a show full of misdirection, just when you think he has taken you to a place of honesty, the narration swerves, and shows that we are falling into the tropes of “inspiration porn”, where the disabled person overcomes all their challenges and finds happiness.
It’s a bold and intimate show, constantly subverting our expectations, and the title is an excellent pun on the word falling: falling in love, falling for a lie, falling into our own expectations. And Pang plays beautifully with our acceptance and perception. As he says, with his cane, he can get anyone to feel sad for him, and people fall over themselves to help him out, especially if he heightens his disability. It is playful and subversive, and the intimacy of the venue makes us feel close and uncomfortable at times, and this show is highly recommended for that.
