The PIT Collective are back at the Fringe, though this time they feel it’s with added pressure. ‘Whereas before we were just students, now this feels very much like it’s for keeps’, they tell me. I’m talking to David Byrne (writer and director), Leah Milner (lead actress and production manager) and Simon Perkins (actor and… well he ‘does all our technical stuff’). They laugh when I’m confused about the variety of roles each of them has. ‘We were taught (at Hull University) to do a little bit of everything (welding, costume making, etc)’ they explain, ‘and we realised the only way to keep doing ‘a little bit of everything’ was to form our own company’. And that’s how PIT was born, a group of, what they call, ‘multi-disciplined theatre makers’.
At this year’s Fringe, PIT is bringing David Byrne’s play ‘A Stroke of Genius’, based on a 1980 true story where a man in America decided to open a sperm bank exclusively for the sperm of Nobel Prize Winners. ‘This led us to discuss and explore the idea of why people might want a ‘genius’ child’, Byrne says. ‘We did a really rough reading in November and from there (the play) just grew. The Pleasance Theatre (Anthony and Christopher) saw a scratch run of it and decided to help us through their Charlie Hartill Special Reserve scheme and brought us to Edinburgh’.
From this sperm bank idea, the plot developed to that of Dora Blake, ‘the last in a long line of women in her family that runs a Last Editions Library way out in the country. Faced with closure she hatches a plan to have a child so she won’t end up on the streets and homeless. Wanting the best for her child, she chooses a very famous academic and National Hero as the Father , who just happens to be coming to her library on a book tour’.
But don’t expect a serious analysis of human relations, I’m assured, ‘As with all PIT shows, this will be fun, exciting… we’ve got animation, puppetry, library trolleys and lots and lots of cardboard boxes’, which, all in all, this makes it not only one of the most interesting plays in this year’s program, but also a very visually random one…
IN FIVE WORDS
Favourite thing about your show?
It’s not that long, honest!
Favourite thing about the Festival?
Everything is covered in batter.
Where can we find you when you’re not performing?
Is ‘whore house’ two words?
What are you most looking forward to once it’s all over?
Recovering from jaundice and scurvy.
Catch A Stroke of Genius from the 5th till the 31st (not 17th nor 24th), at 14:40 at the Pleasance Dome. And don’t forget to check their website for more information!
Adrian G. Velazquez
