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Fringe 2018: Q&A with Morna Burdon on Gie’s Peace

How would you describe your show in one sentence?

A hopeful show using songs and stories to shine a light on ordinary and extraordinary women worldwide over many years who have found their own ways to take a stance against war.

NB Gie’s Peace means Give Us Peace

Is this a new show or have you performed it elsewhere?

This is a new show.

Is this your first visit to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe?

No.

How many times have you performed at the Fringe before?

I have taken part in over a dozen – as a director/producer/actor/singer/street performer/workshop leader/ host.

What’s your favourite thing about the Fringe??

My favourite thing this year is that I get to sing songs of peace and tell stories about women who risked and risk so much to achieve peace. My show is set up as a creative response to the hell of war, all part of an International Festival set up to include the excluded.

How have you been preparing for the Fringe? How has the show developed/changed since your original idea?

I was researching last year’s Fringe show, Bonnie Fechters, and found a story about the women imprisoned and tortured in the Tiger Cages in the Vietnam war, how they were encouraged knowing that peace activists were highlighting their plight and how they sang to keep hope alive.

Since then I have been reading, researching and mainly talking to people and as ever, when you do that, people have their stories. The woman on the bus, the mother of the bride at a wedding, the woman who rented me out a rehearsal room – one a spy in WW2, one a renegade peace camper, one on her way to an action and they go…

What do you think sets your show apart from all the other Festival offerings?

I think It is unique in that I thread together the stories of so many unknown women from throughout the world and over centuries who have responded to hellish circumstances with such courage, independent thinking & creativity.  Their work continues to inspire by the re- telling of their lives and actions. I tell Scottish stories and they chime with stories from throughout the world. W need to tell at least as many stories about peace as we do about war.

 What’s the show that you don’t want to miss at this year’s Fringe?

To be honest, I have not had much time to look. If Alan Cumming was on I would go to see him again and again to watch someone who has honed every second of his work to show this facet, that facet – it is magical watching him work at his craft and you just know the hours that have gone into his high-wire act. And he loves it!

If your show was a place in Edinburgh, which place would it be and why?

It would be Dr Neil’s Garden which sits near Duddingston Loch and was created by Drs Nancy and Andrew Neil. If I think of peacefulness, this is the place in Edinburgh that comes to mind.

Gie’s Peace

Fri 17 – Sun 19, Fri 24, Sat 25 Aug, 1pm

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