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Christopher Bingham
5 followers
7 Video Views·Nov 11, 2022
Sunday morning is croissant day.
Mmm, that one's mine.
Don't look at me at this time of the morning in this frame of mine.
It's the 11th, I think the 11th day of Fringe.
It's hard to keep track.
And I'm just walking around in the rain today seeing shows.
The next show I'm seeing is happening at a Novo hotel.
It's incredible how they transform this city.
They turn sheds, bedrooms, tents, gardens, churches.
You name it, they all become theatre.
And if you own a building or a garage or a warehouse or a packing container,
somebody's going to do theatre in it.
So I've been in Edinburgh three weeks now and it's about time I started finding the meaning,
you know, finding the message in all of this.
But I'm just so exhausted.
Yes.
It's been a roller coaster.
What's the best decision you've made?
I watched Electrolyte.
Okay.
Electrolyte was ******* awesome.
It was so much fun.
Gorgeous, powerful, resonated in your bones for lots of different reasons
and live soundtracks in a ******* sick way.
What up my dude?
I've got a lot of bubbles on my sock.
I don't know if you can see.
I haven't looked under the underside of them.
Oh, they've died to death, these socks, haven't they?
I'm trying to figure out why I am so tired.
Now it could be the constant staying out till 4am.
That's one theory.
It could be the heightened consumption of alcohol and junk food.
The fact that every other day I sleep on the ground
because Tom and I are sharing a bedroom and the bed is quite small.
But you know what?
You know what?
I think it's all the freaking art.
I don't think the human body was designed to consume so much art.
You at least need to spread it out.
I don't like the tap water here in Scotland.
It doesn't have all the mind control chemicals in it like in London.
I've been drinking a lot of bottled.
At the same time though, I also feel energized.
I feel creatively charged and wired.
My brain's been firing in all directions.
I've been coming up with jokes, coming up with ideas for videos.
You name it.
More than anything, I feel inspired and driven to perform.
To get up on a stage and make IRL people laugh and think and get sad and stuff.
Wait, hang on.
This feels familiar.
I've said this before.
Being out here with Elliot makes me want to perform more.
Not necessarily music.
I want to act more.
I want to voice act more.
Even if the pay's terrible.
Even if the pay's nothing.
I want to get myself out there more.
I want to be in front of people.
It was the last time I was in Scotland on tour with Elliot Morris.
It's Scotland!
Scotland does something to my brain.
It fills me with this desire to do stand-up and come up with a one-man show and do an improv course.
Maybe it's the tap water.
Scotland's trying to turn me into some performer and I can't help it.
I can't stop it.
It's getting in my brain.
It's wafting up through my ears and into my brain and trying to turn me into some kind of improv comedian.
Scotland!
Scotland, you bastard!
Stop it!
I just want to make money and sell out.
Quit trying to change me, Scotland.
Somebody on the street looked up while I was doing that.
And you know what?
I didn't care.
Because I'm a performer now.
I belong on the stage.
I need to go home.
But we've got one week left, Chris.
One week.
We can make it.
It's my last full day here at Edinburgh.
Exactly.
I'm going to see In Addition one last time.
I'm going to see a couple other things and then we will drink and we will hang out.
And then I will go home.
Which actually we're all looking forward to.
So much has happened in the last like week alone.
I don't really know how to process it all.
My sister visited for a few days.
My sister is here.
I made it.
You made it.
You're in Edinburgh now.
It took me a while.
Welcome to Edinburgh.
Hi, thank you.
Welcome to the Edinburgh Fringe.
It's very wet today and I haven't slept very well.
But I brought my sister to see the show.
I hope she likes it.
I'm so excited.
I really can't wait.
I really can't.
Yeah, that's adorable.
When I make a noise, guys, I want you to be twins coming down the birth canal.
Sam head home.
I'm heading home.
How many shows are left?
Four shows are left.
And then it'll be over for everyone.
If I can get real for just a moment,
there's something else I've learned about this lifestyle while I've been here.
That it's unsustainable.
If you're not careful, you run yourself down so easily.
You get sick.
You get tired.
I can't remember a day I've been here that I didn't have pain in my back or bags under my eyes
or feel just a little bit nauseous from food or drink.
It's so easy to get swept up in the festival energy and make bad decisions.
Spend too much, stay out too late, become your worst self.
And although it's tempting to romanticize it and say that all your emotions are raw
and all your creativity is right at the surface,
that's also when you make yourself most vulnerable
and when you're most prone to making mistakes, miscalculations.
So yeah, I'm creatively motivated and I'm driven and I want to learn new skills
and I want to make new cool stuff.
But I want to find a way of taking that energy home with me
that isn't damaging to my well-being or the well-being of people around me.
I could not have done what the cast and crew of In Addition did
every morning, every day for a whole month.
Getting up and performing such an emotionally draining beautiful piece of theater
and then working more and then socializing and staying out
and then getting up and doing it again.
I know that I'm not currently capable of doing that.
Then I need to learn how to look after myself better,
to stay disciplined in the face of chaos,
to stay tempered in the face of exhaustion,
to practice moderation in all things and be able to say,
no, I've got to make some art in the morning.
I'm going to bed.
You're going to be very tired and it's going to be very long
but it's so much fun and you've got to love it for that
and you've got to go in and keep seeing shows even though you're tired
and have a sick time with all your mates because that's what we're here for, right?
To make wonderful art that we think is important for people
and to spread it.
Go and spread your art.
I'd like to thank a whole bunch of people for making my first fringe experience
one to remember.
Top of the list, everyone who has lived in this flat with me for the last month
and all the people new and old that I got to spend time with.
Brian McElhaney, Ed and Tommy from Jolly Boat,
Poltergeist Theatre, Dutch Kills, Damian aka Gary Starr,
Natalie aka Nate,
the amazing staff and street team and volunteers at Underbelly
without whom we couldn't do any of it.
Everyone that took a flyer from me in the street,
everyone that came up to me and said hi,
everyone who recommended something cool to do in Scotland.
If you enjoyed the music in this video and want to hear more
there'll be a link in the down to get the soundtrack to in addition.
Also, some of it will appear on the upcoming Hi-Fi Spaceship album
which once I get back to London I will be working full steam ahead on.
Next time you see me I'll be back in my regular room
and I've got something kind of interesting to share with you.
Something I've been working on under the wire.
This has been amazing.
But I'm also ready to go home and return to my real life.
I think the best decision I made was assembling this team of people.
I think that's probably like the best decision.
So to interrupt this intro, Chris,
we're talking about this absolutely pissed off diet of carrots.
I did two carrots and I got bored.
I will eat all of these on my own.
I'm typically a pig, I'm a pile of carrots.
You can enjoy that, that's what you're going to get.
Case in point, right?
Come on in mate, come on in.
Get it in, get it in!
