AliceFraser

Edinblog Day 16, 17, 18: Bin Strikes and Saturday Nights. Quiet parts and loud parts.

I think Friday night audiences may have redeemed themselves for me - I’ve always been a fan of the Thursday night audience, but I have to say this year they’ve trended a little bit sitting-back-you-do-the-work-theatre-type-crowds, while Friday nights (often on the angry/tired vibe side) have been a genuine delight.

Bear in mind when I talk about the vibe or mood of a audience that I’m not talking about any individual in the audience: as an individual in an audience youâ...

Edinblog Day 13, 14, 15: time compression

Wednesday we did the first All Live Gargle!

Here are three variously hungover, periody and recently bitten exhausted Festival humans. (Fun game, guess which is which! Bonus points for the one who has a boob rash - listen to the episode to find out!!!) For a project that started in lockdown, it has been so delightful to work with such talented people over zoom calls, I’d...

Salon Details for today

Today’s Zoom Salon will be at 1pm U.K. time (or your local equivalent)

Tea With Alice Salon 71

Time: Aug 17, 2022 01:00 PM London

Link:

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82189320186

The LIVE salon will be at 2pm at the Tea House on Saint Patrick Square.

2022-08-17 10:59:03 +0000 UTC View Post

Edinblog Day 11 & 12: Day Off, and Day NOT OFF. Plus postponing 2pm live Salon today til 2pm tomorrow. (And reasons)

Last night after a relaxing day off, I got a message from my U.K. Agent saying Have I Got News For You is running auditions in London this week and would you be up for a day trip to london before your show tomorrow.

So after a night of MINIMAL SLEEP (it’s almost like babies can sense when you’re unsettled - this is a joke. Babies are the most finely tuned vibe-ometers known to humankind, and of course she was going to wiggle all night and pat my face with her fat little ...

Edinblog Day 8-10: what are days anyway?

Day 8: Friday

Today’s the end of the first week, but the second Friday I’ve performed the show. I’m looking forward to it, because in my head the ‘first’ (second) Friday is the point at which the show is what it’s going to be for the rest of the run. Barring epiphanies, it’s just going to be me finding more little jokes in the show, rather than any big structural experiments.

The sound bleed from the venue next door is brutal though. I was talking to John...

Edinblog Day 7: how did I lose two days?

My goodness. Wednesday was an absolutely wild day.

The internet was so slow it wasn’t even letting me send texts on messaging apps, and I was facing down the barrel of both a Salon and a Gargle. I pulled the salon (sorry!), but the gargle employs a number of people, so I couldn’t just take away their work for the day. Which meant a frantic scramble to find a place that was both quiet and had good internet, packed (what I thought was all) my things up, fed and put the baby down for ...

Salon today Cancelled

Im sorry gang! The wifi here is too bad for video calls, and I have to stick close to home. Next week I will be able to do it from the artist’s bar in the pleasance, which apparently has good wifi. Massive apologies.

Xxx

A

Edinblog Day 4: half price Monday

The audience tonight was lovely and full and I was so tired I barely kept my tongue working. Not to complain about being tired, but them’s the facts ma’am. Last night I thought, the show’s working okay, and I’m in Edinburgh! I should go home and feed laser after the show and then actually get out of the house and be social for once! I will meet up with Tiff at the Gilded Balloon Artist’s bar and have a chat. Just a short chat, I’ll be home by midnight!

Friends, I was home by...

Edinblog Day 3: Sunday, Bloody Sunday.

This music shop has a travel sized five string banjo that I go in and look at every day, thinking maybe this would fit into my suitcase and solve all my problems. Next time I’ll bring a tape measure, I think to myself.

Last night’s show flew! Which was a relief, though of course you’d rather the loudly appreciative audience on the night the reviewer was in. Though that said, who cares about reviewers (answer, heaps of people, but you’d rather not).

I don’t know what nig...

Edinblog: Day 2

Last night was hard work too! I’m glad I’ve run this show a bunch before bringing it to edinburgh, or I’d be starting to worry now. Something about delivering your jokes to a smiling silence makes you doubt everything. You tune into your own cadences and start to feel the words in your mouth. Am I still speaking English? Are these jokes?

Is it me? Is it the lighting? The space? Some ineffable smell? And knowing you have a reviewer in during a show like that ads a pinch of defeat ...

Edinblog day 1: Opening Night

Last night’s last preview was a disaster. Just a nice quiet smiling audience slowly sapping my confidence in the show as noise bleed from the nearby rooms filled the empty space where laughs should have been. But it’s opening night tonight! Good to go in hungry. And the telegraph is in, and another reviewer. So that’s nice.

Generally I’m biased against Friday night audiences in favour of Thursday night audiences, but maybe because last night’s Thursday was bad, ton...

Tea With Alice Salon 69 Link

Tea With Alice Salon 69

Time: Aug 5, 2022 01:00 PM London

Link:

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82107188835

Edinblog Day Minus 1

I officially open on Friday, but had a preview last night (Wednesday), and will have another tonight. Then a reviewer from the telegraph in on Friday, so I guess I better brush the rust off quick!

I alternate being really pleased with this show - I like it a lot - with feeling like if I broke it apart and put it back together I would find something better. But I don’t have time, and it’s possible that the second feeling is just… the human condition at work.

I’m hoping to...

On the train again: Checklists

I’m on the train en route to Edinburgh, with the anticipation of (I assume) a gladiator entering the ring after a year (or two) of sharpening their weapons.

I’ve bought a couple of HEPA filters for my room in the Gilded Balloon, in the hope that’ll make things a little safer and more comfortable for my audience. It reminds me of my first edinburgh where I was in a room with a curtain for a door and no windows or airflow, buying fans and bottles of water for my audience. I like pe...

Fringe Content: Pre-Fringe Advice Opinion Column 1

Someone on Twitter asked for Fringe Advice for Artists who might not be selling many tickets. Here are some of my thoughts.

It’s entirely legitimate to think of the Edinburgh Fringe as a rapacious monster eating all of your money and talent, in which case, I would suggest not going. There are plenty of things about the fringe that are too expensive, unfair, exhausting. If you’re going because you think it’s going to be your big break, you’d better be already represen...

Salon link for today ALL LEVELS

Tea With Alice Salon 68

Time: Jul 27, 2022 01:00 PM London

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89765445994

My ten favourite…

I haven’t got PR at the Fringe this year, because I think the landscape of publicity has changed so much that I sort of don’t think anyone knows what they’re doing.

As such I can’t really afford to blow thousands of pounds for someone to be figuring out what the New World looks like and how you can boost an act in an environment where there are fewer and fewer reliable publicity buttons to press.

Because I am not a hot new newcomer act with a photogenically interesting b...

Bodies bodies bodies and salon date…

Hallo!

Tonight is my only central London show of CHRONOS before I head to edinburgh this (!)* weekend. Doing a split preview with Laura Davis, so it’ll be a lovely night. I think tickets are heading towards all sold out, so if you’re thinking of coming, don’t necessarily expect to get one on the door.

Laura and I went on a friend date to see Daniel Kitson doing an outdoor gig in the park last night - the first time I’ve left Laser Fraser for a thing that isn’t work. Wh...

Salon 67 Link

Tea With Alice Salon 67

Time: Jul 14, 2022 01:00 PM London

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/81543947481

What Trigger Warnings Should I Have?

One of the venues I’m doing a performance at this week has sent this very lovely and sensitive message through and it’s thrown me into a bit of a tizzy. As the subject of trigger warnings comes forcibly round into my brain again, I should warn you, i’m about to discuss it.

Weaponised by the culture wars, at various times it’s seemed reduced to the conflicting cartoon ideas that All Nice OR Only Wimpy people want trigger warnings and All Brave, Honest OR Only Cruel He...

This Week’s Gigs

The live salon was genuinely lovely, and everything I could have hoped. A bunch of really nice people talking about things over tea. All of them have bodies that continue below their collarbones and sides and backs to their heads, too! Which I’d assumed but until today would not have been able to guarantee.

This week’s gigs are a very mixed bag. My favourite one will be Tuesday in Manchester, but I’m also doing a (last minutely booked) london preview in Honor Oak.

...