When Fleabag first hit the stage at Edinburgh Fringe Festival audiences were captivated by the hard-hitting, raw and hilarious one-woman monologue Phoebe Waller-Bridge offered. Working with friend and exceptionally talented director, Vicky Jones, the two have managed to immaculately tell the dark and twisted tale of grief and guilt through the eyes of twenty-something Fleabag. The play received such great critical acclaim that it was picked up by the BBC for a full series in 2016. It was upon the release of said series that Fleabag grew to the heights it has reached today. It has a 100% Rotten Tomatoes rating and was voted by the Telegraph as one of the ’80 Best BBC Shows of All Time’.
The show takes the audience through the life of Fleabag, a somewhat hopeless but equally loveable lady as she deals with the trials and tribulations of London life and the ongoing grieving for her best friend. The creation from Waller-Bridge and Jones brought a brand-new voice to television. It is one that is unapologetic but entirely aware of itself. Fleabag is not afraid to be herself but only away from the public eye. She will throw herself into any situation only to question why she is there in the first place with the narrative taking the viewer through the highs and lows of human life whilst also expertly showing the mundanities that come with existence itself. Soho Theatre perfectly described Fleabag as “angry, pervy, confrontational, cruel, forgetful, flippant, capricious, but undeniably honest.”
The TV show had Waller-Bridge, Hugh Skinner, Sian Clifford, Olivia Colman, Brett Patterson and Hugh Dennis starring among others in an excellent portrayal of the one-woman monologue. With the backdrop of context to her story, Fleabag took on a life of its own. There are so many moments in which the audience will be able to see themselves, or someone they love, in Fleabag which offers a warm sense of comfort in knowing you, or they, are not alone. From the 5th until 9th June there is the exciting opportunity to see Fleabag in its original one-woman monologue format, performed by Maddie Rice, at The Old Market in Hove.
The New Yorker called Fleabag a “precision black-humour mechanism, a warped and affecting fable about one single woman’s existence” whilst the New York Times sung it’s praises for the “restless, almost feral energy and its slap in the face attitude”. If you haven’t yet seen the TV series, we will save the surprises and twists but we highly recommend you take the chance to see the award-winning production for yourself. Tickets are available here. We spoke to the director, Vicky Jones, to find out all about Fleabag and why it resonated so much with people all around the world.
Firstly I’d like to say congratulations for the huge success of Fleabag, I am so excited that it’s coming to Brighton! It’s now been nearly two years since the release and further success of the TV series. How have you found the reception to Fleabag?
It’s been beyond amazing. There’s something about the story that we never really expected to happen. All kinds of different people responded to it after the TV release. People will go up to Phoebe and tell her they love it or that their mum loves it or that their Gran loves it or their brother, anyone and everyone! We never anticipated that and it has been such a compliment and testament to Phoebe’s great writing and storytelling skills but also her performance. She’s able to make somebody who behaves very, very badly still a very likeable person. You see her character in pain and the pain within the story is universal.
The internal monologue of the character is something we all have on a daily basis. You both tapped into it with such precision I was overwhelmed at times with just how relatable she was. Why do you think Fleabag resonated so much with people?
I think it’s the the fact she’s suffering from trauma and on the surface she’s completely fine. I think often in drama you see the trauma being played out, which is a great thing to do dramatically but Phoebe was always very clear she wanted to hold the drama down and just not show anything. The audience must have resonated as that’s the real human way of treating trauma. It’s easier to hide it than show it. We looked at Catcher in the Rye and when reading that book you know that Holden Caulfield is dealing with something even though it’s never explicitly said. The reader knows there must be something there. In part due to the tiny little things they do and when you look at Fleabag, you can see that in her love of the guinea pig. She claims she hates it but she looks after it really well, as though it’s the only thing in her life which is untouched from trauma.
I read that you met Phoebe after a mishap at an early job – what a blessing in a disguise! What was the initial creative process like when working with her and developing the play?
When we started we had a theatre company called ‘DryWrite’ which has now become our production company of the same name. In its early days, it was an experimental theatre company which encouraged writers to write to a specific brief. We would get them to choose something which would make the audience fall in love with the character or hate them or we would try and create suspense. We were just producers to start with and we would ask as many writers as we could to be involved in our nights. The audience would vote on the stories they most responded to…it was kind of like a gym! We’d exercise the skills in a safe place, and present them anonymously and see which worked best. This is where Phoebe debuted her idea for Fleabag.
The writers got into it because it was a real challenge and for a long time we were just honing our skills as a big group. Meanwhile Phoebe was a wonderful actress doing her wonderful thing. When we first met, she’d just finished university and drama school so was really struggling and now look at her go!
Vicky talking about Fleabag.
There’s been a huge drive recently on social media for acceptance. Fleabag certainly made me feel more comfortable with talking about sex and masturbation with my friends. Do you think it is important for young women to discuss their sex lives openly without fear of judgement?
I think shame is a really controlling factor in women’s lives. The relationships we have towards sexuality, curiosity and all of the opportunities that come our way in which we can express ourselves sexually, all carry with them an element of shame and social judgement. It’s so mental that we are bound by those social attitudes. It is important that we embrace and take control of our own sexuality because otherwise it is controlled by the patriarchy. We’re told that our value lies in our looks and looking a certain way and that we have to be a kind of sexy that we don’t always identify with. We’re alienated by our relationships with sex and that’s not right.
It feels as though over the past year, things have been said that should have been a very long time ago. I think that’s why Phoebe’s work was great. It was before ‘Me Too’ and started a conversation when it was still kind of taboo. It’s really refreshing to be able to say “Yes! People are talking about this now in a positive way.” Fleabag was written in 2013 and at that time, feminism wasn’t such an openly discussed topic and there wasn’t much clear leadership. I am very happy that the subjects we were bringing up then are now part of an open conversation with everyone.
What can the audience expect from Maddie Rice’s performance? How does her portrayal differ from Phoebe’s?
Maddie is stunning. She is the only person we could imagine doing it aside from Phoebe. We auditioned so many people and she was the one that we both immediately said “oh thank god there’s someone else who can do it.” There are a hell of a lot of gear changes in the theatre performance. It’s comedic and then it’s very, very sad and emotional. It turns on a sixpence every which way. Maddie comes from a comedy background so she is brilliant at that side, she has an amazing knack of rocking the audience with laughter. She is fantastic at the emotional stuff as well…she’s just a rocket. She’s also a very different person from Phoebe, Phoebe’s come from a dramatic side and Maddie has come from the comedic so there’s a difference there. Maddie is a wonderful, emotional, beautiful human being and she really lets that shine through.
If you had a snippet of advice for the women, and people, who see themselves in Fleabag – what would it be?
Talk to your friends. As a woman, try not to let yourself be judged by the things you been brought up to believe you should be judged by. Try to hold your own counsel and like yourself despite the way society expects you to be. Give yourself a break when you need it.
