Deadline at the Fringe are interviewing performers across the month, putting 20 questions to them – both as an artist and as their stage or performance alter ego.
Russell Dean, Artistic Director of Strangeface Theatre company has worked as a freelance designer/maker and facilitator for Trestle Theatre Company, Red Ladder, and on Billy Elliot, amongst many others.
Russell wrote and directed The Hit, a solo puppet show born from the question, Who really has control? The production follows the journey of hit man Mikey, a controller of life an death.
Russell Dean
- First impressions of our fair city and, why are you here?
Smooth stone, big windows, high ceilings. Excitement and the need for good shoes.
- Does your time here bring on joy or dread?
Both in equal measure, so many great shows and people tempered with the fear of some horrific unseen banana skin.
- Are you a happy soul or do the occasionally dreich elements make you morose?
Melancholy is a part of my DNA.
- Where will you visit on your day off and why?
The Well Hung and Tender burger van.
- Do you ever get jealous of other performers?
There’s so much talent here it’s best to enjoy it rather than feeling inferior. That way madness lies.
- Did you have a happy childhood?
Not always happy but I have a lot of good stories about growing up with six siblings. I’m surprised we all made it to adulthood.
- What does success and failure mean to you?
Success is staying excited, failure is just necessary.
- Are you superstitious when it comes to performing?
Don’t we all have lucky pants?
- What is your biggest fear before going on stage?
Having a coughing fit.
- What is your favourite saying?
The consolation of imaginary things is not imaginary consolation
- What is your worst habit?
Quoting Roger Scruton.
- What do you love/hate about the festival?
I love the feeling that anything can happen from moment to moment. I hate the fact that at some point I have to sleep.
- Tell me about your most passionate embrace.
Three oclock in the morning in a Luxembourg theatre whilst finishing a set for Heart of a Dog.’ We’re married now.
- Do you wear knickers under your kilt?
Not since then Luxembourg.
- Most embarrassing moment?
Dancing with my eyes closed to Shakin’ Stevens’ Green Door only to find when I opened them the floor had parted to enjoy my moves.
- Where is your favourite place in the world and why?
Tonbridge park. It has a crazy golf course with no sense of irony. Most days it feels like Mr Benn’s Festive Rd.
- Who would you be if you were not you?
I always wanted to be Oliver Postgate.
- What Scottish delicacies do you enjoy and, do any of them fill you with fear?
I have an addiction to tablet and before I gave up drinking, a pint of heavy.
- What is your greatest ambition?
Aside from not failing too badly at being a parent? I would like to carrying on touring Strangeface shows around the world.
- How can we bring world peace?
A little more self knowledge.
Mikey
- First impressions of our fair city and, why are you here?
It’s great to be here! Like a beautiful asylum. I’m Mikey, aka The Ghost, and star of Strangeface’s The Hit.
- Does your time here bring on joy or dread?
Both, but to different people.
- Are you a happy soul or do the occasionally dreich elements make you morose?
You make your own weather.
- Where will you visit on your day off and why?
Surgeon’s Hall Museums.
- Do you ever get jealous of other performers?
Best be yourself, everyone else is taken.
- Did you have a happy childhood?
Childhood is a jungle, not everyone makes it out.
- What does success and failure mean to you?
If you have to ask you’ve already failed.
- Are you superstitious when it comes to performing?
No, I’m blessed.
- What is your biggest fear before going on stage?
Losing a limb.
- What is your favourite saying?
You can get much further with a kind word and a gun than you can with a kind word alone.
- What is your worst habit?
Quoting Al Capone.
- What do you love/hate about the festival?
I love the anonymity of crowds and hate the possibility of being seen first.
- Tell me about your most passionate embrace.
Svetlana Ivanova as she lay dying under a 98 Buick.
- Do you wear knickers under your kilt?
No, just a Glock 17.
- Most embarrassing moment?
Improvising without a Glock.
- Where is your favourite place in the world and why?
Tokyo. Clean. Great sushi.
- Who would you be if you were not you?
Deacon Brodie.
- What Scottish delicacies do you enjoy and, do any of them fill you with fear?
I’m a sucker for salmon, but haggis sits a little heavy.
- What is your greatest ambition?
To see my daughter smile.
- How can we bring world peace?
You are definitely asking the wrong person buddy.
