Mornings are fuelled by buckets of tea, good tunes and monster breakfasts. Our flat is lovely this year, we've got a big kitchen table we all sit around and discuss anything we need to do that day. Producer Jake Orr is tapping away and fellow actor Dan Foxsmith is dancing around in his socks. Emails are sent, phone calls are made, more tea is brewed…
Charlotte Josephine
I love Edinburgh, it's such a beautiful city. Even the tap water tastes better than in London. I love the weather; I find the rain really relaxing. Relaxing is the theme of this year's fringe for me. I've made lots of mistakes at past fringes, burning the candle at both ends. This year I'm leaving the drama on stage, and enjoying a relaxed time in this pretty city. BLUSH is an intense show, physically and emotionally draining so Dan and I are really taking care of ourselves, keeping things nice and simple, allowing more by doing less.
Eat well and sleep well is some golden advice so we're often at the jacket potato place at the bottom of the Royal Mile, or the baba-ganoush wrap place near Fringe Central, or Black Medicine café for toasted bagels and lush coffee.
Our venue is great, but damp and over crowded, so we spend as little time as possible there, warming up early in the flat then wandering over. We've got quite a hectic get-in, but the Underbelly team is brilliant and we've usually got time for a quick sweaty hug and a nervous giggle before the house opens.
The warm up is a process of psyching-down for me rather than psyching-up, something I learnt whilst training to box. I need to be relaxed but focused, picking my shots, landing images for the audience. Fear does funny things to you, and my default when scared is to hit it hard and fast. So I need to calm down and focus, re-find all that lovely detail that director Ed Stambollouian pulled out of me in rehearsals.
The audiences have been lovely, really receptive and open. Seth Rook Williams and James Turner have designed the lights and set in a way that allows us to really see the audience, there's nowhere to hide, we're really sharing the story with them.
Then it's over before we know it, and afterwards, we have a quick wet-wipe-wash in our very classy dressing room and go catch a show. We're excited to see Rash Dash and Fellswoop Theatre and Dan Canham. Fat Rascal, Stay Up Late and Superglue Assembly made us really proud to be from The East 15 Contemporary Theatre course. The rest of the Underbelly Untapped season is brilliant; we'd really recommend seeing those shows. Then we wander back to the flat to cook and watch some shit telly and get an early night. It's a lot less rock and roll than you might think, but yeah we're having a good time and feel really grateful to be here.
BLUSH is at Underbelly Cowgate (Big Belly) until 28th August at 18:00.
Tagged in Edinburgh Festival Fringe