“Rebel with Rules,” Louise Leigh returns to the Edinburgh Fringe with her show, Distracted. Breaking the rules and taking names (or handing out flyers) Leigh sits down with Pepper&Salt to about her new hour, driving through Paris in a sports car and carpeing as much as the diem as possible.
What is the elevator pitch for your show?
It’s about menopause and breaking the rules, and not breaking the rules. And to some extent it’s about parenting teens and what young people call re-parenting my own teenage self. But it’s funny.
What do you hope audiences take away from this show?
I want audiences to see middle-aged women things as something beyond the clichés. I think I’ve done a lot of clichéd middle-aged lady stuff and I want people to understand the why middle-aged ladies do these things. And to see us as whole people with pasts and futures. And also have a ruddy, bloody good laugh about it!
How did you start doing comedy?
I always wanted to do it. When I was 16, I wanted to be Julie Walters, and I wanted to be a comedy actor. I did a lot of drama at school, I did a drama degree, and I remember making people laugh, just being the best feeling. Listening to an audience of people laughing at the stuff that I was doing onstage was the best feeling. But then I just didn’t for various reasons, and when I was about 40, I started getting sort of what one might describe as signals from the universe that maybe I could have a go and do it. So, I did a course and I just sort of thought, “Well, I’ll do the course and I’ll discover that I am rubbish and not funny and I will be able to go like I tried it, and I don’t have to do it.” And then I tried it, and I enjoyed it, and I had to do it, I couldn’t stop. I thought it was just going to be like a kind of one-off, like so many things one does as part of a mid-life; I’ve done one triathlon, and I knew I wasn’t going to do another, I thought it was going to be like triathlons, and it turns out, it made me feel whole. I just felt immediately at home, I remember stepping into the lights at the first gig, and just going, “Oh, it’s just this, it’s home.” I haven’t stopped really.
I want to say the line from the song, ‘Did we ever drive through Paris in a sports car with the warm wind in our hair?’ Did we ever do that thing that we always said?
What is the main idea or theme that you explore in your show?
We’re so focused on doing everything when we’re young when there’s loads of life left, but when you hit your 40s you do kind of go, “Oh for real, this is the one. It’s a one-shot business. I’m not going to get loads of time to do this over.” And I’m over 50 now, and that galloping sense of ‘you get one go’ is just increasing really. And if there’s something 16/17/18-year-old you planned to do, you get to the point where you go, When it comes to the end, I’m gonna have this conversation where she’s going to turn up and be like, “..did we ever uh… did we ever?” I want to say the line from the song, ‘Did we ever drive through Paris in a sports car with the warm wind in our hair?’ Did we ever do that thing that we always said? And we go, “No, but we did this, this and this.” But it’s like, that was the main thing, you know? That was the main thing that we wanted to do when we were 18 and go, “We did the main thing, we had a go at the main thing.” There is both time to do things when you’re older and there is also less time to mess about with it. You can’t kick every single ambition endlessly down the curb for later, there’s got to be a time when you go, “Actually, now. This is that time.” I think that’s the idea that drives me on.
In terms of the show, it’s as much about that, but it’s about managing my children’s teenage how my children have manifested as teenagers. I’m having that conversation with my teenage self because I’m watching my teenagers make those same choices and having this sort of ‘all their lives ahead of them’ time to dream and how I support them really to do their things. And how difficult it is to watch them have all the adventures and. I keep talking about this outside the show, how difficult and exciting it is to think about them going off to have all the to live that very, very vivid time of their lives and know that that’s over for me. And see them step into their youth, and their beauty and adventures is really lovely, but also it’s a lot to hold. And so many things you want to get done. I think for friends of mine who are a little bit older than me, they’re going, “Oh I’m starting to say goodbye to the things I’m never going to do and made peace with them,” and I’m not quite at that stage yet, I’m more just thrashing around still trying to get them done.
What are you looking forward to the most in returning to the Edinburgh Fringe?
I’m looking forward to being on a bit later in the day, because I’m on at 3:30, and I’ve always done it at like 12 which is so early and means that you can’t time shift and you can’t stay up late. So, I’m excited to see some stuff that’s later in the day, not having to go to bed at 10pm every night. And I’m excited about the fact that I have made this show in a shorter time. The last show was made of 6 years worth of effort and this is the difficult second album, and I love it. And that’s almost more exciting than making a debut, to kind of go, “Actually, I can make an hour’s work and I can make people laugh and I can hold their attention for an hour, and I know I can do that.” This time I’ve made something better and quicker. And that’s really exciting. I love being in Edinburgh. I love walking down the street and going, “Hello, hi! I’ve gigged with you, I’ve gigged with you, you’re my hero! Are you my cousin?” Cause I was brought up around there, so I love just knowing everybody and feeling like I’m part of a big community, and I love being in Scotland because that’s where I’m from. And I love the comradery that you get on the Royal Mile when you’re flyering at the same time every day, so you get to bond with the magicians and improvisers and people doing different shows and just feel that sense of community. And it’s all the same, it’s all the theatre nerds in one place, I love it!
How does this show relate to your debut?
It relates to it in the way that all of my stuff relates; how I balance being a respectable person and what it is to be a mother and a grown-up whilst containing this kind of maniac comedian person. How do I balance the responsibilities in my life with the fact that I’m an idiot? So, there’s always that. And is it okay to go out and just swan off and be an idiot when you’ve got responsibilities? The other show that I did and a short run in 2019, were about is it okay that I’m an idiot and now it’s like, “Oh no! I’m an idiot, I am a fully-fledged idiot.” And it’s kind of moving along that line of giving myself permission and processing that to do this. And just have this wild life of doing comedy instead of sitting at home knitting, or whatever it is 50 year old women are supposed to do.
Is there anything that audiences should know or be aware of before coming to your shows?
I want an audience to come because they think, “I wouldn’t mind being mates with her,” you know? When I’m choosing an audience – which is how I think of flyering – I’m choosing people that I think “Oh I’d love to be friends with you!” So, if I I’m going to look at someone and think, “Oh I think we’d be mates in real life, come and spend an hour, let’s be mates for an hour.” And that’s sort of how I want people to experience it, as hanging out. That’s if you’re the same sort of generation as me. But if you were younger, I think there’s so much in it for younger people, particularly young women, it’s a conversation with you know your mum’s cousin that you meet at family parties, and she steals your cigarettes, and you chat with her and she’s not your mum? That’s how I kind of feel, that’s what I want to be to younger women, that kind of ‘She’ll tell you a different point of view’ or ‘oh your mum used to be a raver!” That kind of spill your mum’s secrets, that’s kind of my vibe, is like, “Yeah, yeah, yeah, it’s a funeral, let’s get high.” That’s my sort of thing that I want to bring to younger people, but also, you know. One of my friends said, “The thing that I love about watching you do comedy is that you say the stuff that we’re all thinking but we would never say out loud.” That’s a fault in a normal human, but in a comedian that’s a good thing.
How has the industry changed since you first became interested in being part of it?
It’s difficult as an industry outsider back then to see it, but the thing that I cannot tell younger women enough is that comedy was not really for girls. Like actually, in the 90s, doing things wasn’t really for girls, you might have a boyfriend who was in a band, but being in a band, that would be quite a big thing to be trying to do music. There were brilliant women pioneers who were doing it, but culture was for boys and the people who were doing it, were exceptional. The ordinariness of women doing comedy now is just wonderful. I mean it’s still shite in lots of ways because we still don’t have equality in any field and particularly in comedy, you know I’ll still go around as the only woman on a line-up a lot of the time. I would very rarely be booked with another, for example, middle-aged woman, whereas you’ll definitely get two men in their forties on a bill. Or fifties. And that is the biggest change is that there are mums on the circuit, there are women of colour, there is so much diversity of voice out there, and that is absolutely wonderful. Also, the democratisation of the internet! When I was 20, I remember thinking about doing comedy and going, “I don’t even know how, how on earth?!” And the way that you did it is, you went to the pub, and you turned up, and what you turn up on your own and you say out loud that you want to be a comedian? Whereas now, there are so many resources, there’s so many podcasts about how to do it, there’s so much information. Social media has democratised it all so much so while it is more competitive than ever, it is easier than ever to step onto a stage with a notebook and try and say something funny. And that is extraordinary. And I would urge any, particularly women (we don’t need any more boys), but if you are a lady or a woman of any description – even if you’re very vulgar, not a lady at all – I would urge you to give it a go because even if you are shit, you’ll get better. Or just be shit over and over and over and over again like boys do till you get better.
By Katerina Partolina Schwartz
Photo Credit: Esme Buxton
Pepper & Salt 
Leave a comment