The Edinburgh Fringe is almost upon us and to get prepared for another Scottish summer Read About Stuff is running a ‘Five From The Fringe’ interview series, where creative teams answer five questions about their upcoming Festival shows.
In this interview, the team behind American A**holes discuss their new show.
Can you tell me a little about your stand-up show and what audiences can expect?
Our show: American Assholes – Escape to Edinburgh – is a trio of stand-up comedians dissecting identity, politics, and why Americans might in fact…be the worst. Together, the three comics who make up the American Assholes (Dannielle Slaughter, Lauren LoGiudice, and Wayne Charles II), all have material that creates a volatile Venn Diagram of perspectives that somehow lands in a deeply human place. Beneth the outrageousness is a collective search for relief, belonging, and maybe even redemption…maybe.
What inspired these three individual sets, and why do you think it’s a great fit for the Edinburgh Fringe?
Each of us brings a distinct comedic voice to the stage: Lauren LoGiudice is a whimsical poignant variety show within a stand-up set that spirals between satire and sincerity with startling control. Dannielle Slaughter, with machine-gun delivery — disarms audiences with her smokey Southern charm before cutting directly into subjects most people are too polite — or too afraid — to examine openly. And Wayne Charles II delivers conversational storytelling with the ease of a neighborhood regular holding court at last call — balancing sharp honesty with understated wit. It is the best of different genres of stand-up comedy all confronting the same pack of rabid animals.
We (the trio) met on the New York comedy circuit and quickly recognized a shared obsession in our work: unpacking identity, contradiction, and what it means to exist in the US today. Americans are not getting any more popular, this is not a political show, but we do not live in a vacuum. We live in one of the most popular cities in the world, in one of the least popular countries, with the most hated radical allied president in modern history. Rather than shy away from that, we are addressing what it really means for those putting society under the interrogation lamp. Plus – we know everyone is already laughing at American Assholes, so let’s make it official.
What has been the biggest challenge in developing and refining your material for your three person stand up show?
Instead of trying to create a show just because we wanted to go to Fringe, we really dissected our own work and found this common thread, something that allows us to offer a unique and hilarious show to Fringe audiences. It has been years in the making. One pursuit really great comics have is finding the universality of their material. That has to be addressed head on when taking a show to a crowd overseas. We have been working out and stretching the material across the US, which has as many unique backgrounds as it does terrain.
But also being in New York, we put our material and ourselves through the ringer in front of tourists, individuals in rehab facilities, mainstream clubs, alt-rooms, predominately black and Spanish rooms, hostels with people from all parts of the world, free shows, expensive tickets, private events – we’ve run the gambit, all in the search of universal expression. Laughter is a universal sound, and we’re obsessed with it.
How does your individual and collective performance styles, audience interaction, or stage presence shape the experience of the show?
It’s stand-up, it’s about making people laugh – but it’s also about connecting with people. Audiences who may have arrived ready to judge the “Assholes” onstage, by the end of it, only then recognize parts of themselves in the stories being told. Somewhere between the punchlines and provocations, the show invites audiences to confront their own contradictions — and consider how much of our worst behavior, insecurities, and shortcomings might actually be shared.
If you could sum up your show in one word or phrase, what would it be and why?
F**k!
Because it’s funny, you’re going to want to do it afterwards, it’s something we have said often in dealing with all the censorship preparing for the show and it that word pretty well sums up what you’ll say after watching it.
American A**holes runs at Just The Bottle Room at Just The Tonic at The Mash House (Venue 288) from August 20th – 29th. Tickets can be purchased here: https://www.edfringe.com/tickets/whats-on/american-assholes-escape-to-edinburgh
