Paul T Davies reviews Wasteman at Assembly as part of the Edinburgh Fringe.
Photo: Corinne Cumming Wasteman Assembly, Edinburgh Fringe 4 Stars Book Tickets Joe Leather’s semi-autobiographical play was inspired by his experience of working as a bin man during lockdown while performing his drag on Zoom. It’s an accomplished piece, dealing with fighting your inner saboteur and trying to find confidence to perform, and the juxtaposition of working in a heteronormative environment while being gay. The play is well structured as Joe considers and then enters the Miss Stoke pageant and he is a wonderful performer. Plenty of gags to enjoy, but the play was inspired by a personal event, and it’s quite poignant in places, tackling homophobia and attacks, sadly much in the news this week. Ultimately, it’s a celebration of identity and queerness and highly recommended! An original drag coming-of-age story.
Paul is a playwright, director, actor, academic, (he has a PhD from the University of East Anglia), teacher and theatre reviewer! His plays include Living with Luke, (UK tour 2016), Play Something, (Edinburgh Festival Fringe/Drayton Arms Theatre, London 2018), , (2019), and now The Miner’s Crow, which won the inaugural Artist’s Pick of the Fringe Award at the first ever Colchester Fringe Festival 2021. In lockdown 2020 he created the audio series Isolation Alan, available on Youtube, and performed online in the Voice Box Festival. He is the founder member of Stage Write, a Colchester based theatre company, and his acting roles include Rupert in How We Love by Annette Brook, first performed at the Vaults Festival 2020 and revived at the Arcola and at Theatre Peckham in 2021. Follow: @stagewrite_
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