The Camden Fringe is very much up and running right now and long-time TW favourite Penny Ashton is performing there this week as part of the Old Red Lion’s SHAKEFEST, a Shakespeare-themed strand of the festival.

Her show is called ‘The Tempestuous’ and is described as “a brand new Elizabethan tale of magic, meddling and puffed bull’s pizzles, that “Shakespeare himself would be proud of”.

We’ve long been big fans of Penny’s Jane Austen inspired show ‘Promise & Promiscuity’ and were very keen indeed to find out more about her Shakespeare show. So we had a quick chat ahead of the London run.

CM: Can you start by telling us all about the content of your show? What story does it tell?
PA: It’s a hilarious tempestuous tale of stroppy spinster Princess Rosa of Sicily. A musical complete with Fosse dancing, menopausal witches and more Shakespeare puns, quotes and tropes than you can shake a quill at.

It’s a brand new story in the style of a Shakespeare with fittingly feminist saucy sizzle. It is not ‘The Tempest’. I just liked the word tempestuous.

CM: How would you describe it in terms of a style or genre?
PA: It’s a comedy Fakesperean musical.

CM: The title makes it sound like a Shakespeare mashup. What actual level of influence has he had on the show?
PA: Enormous. As with my show ‘Promise & Promiscuity’ – which was an Austen pastiche – this is indeed a mashup of Shakespearean themes and titles.

There are elements of ‘Hamlet’, ‘Taming Of The Shrew’, ‘Romeo And Juliet’, ‘Macbeth’, ‘Merchant Of Venice’, ‘Much Ado About Nothing’ and ‘As You Like It’.

His language, love of a sword pun and idioms abound.

CM: You mentioned your Jane Austen inspired shows. Who wins in a fight between her and Shakey?
PA: As the pen is mightier than the sword it would be a devastating battle of wits methinks.

Shakespeare would thrust with “Aroint thee: go away, rump-fed runion: slut” and she would parry with “I am glad you are not very agreeable, as it saves me the trouble of liking you a great deal”.

Then they would decide that war is “the son of hell” and have a nice natter over some tea and crumpets.

CM: Where did the idea for this show come from?
PA: I have an Austen and Dickens parody and decided I wanted a trilogy so settled on the one man idiom machine that is Willy S.

CM: Can you talk to us about how you go about putting a show together? What’s your creative process like?
PA: It starts with me reading, watching, listening and ingesting vast amounts of the source material. I start to formulate a traditional story line then go into a workshop with my long time collaborator Ben Crowder.

Then we bang it out into a vague storyline and then I go away and write. In this case tapping out iambics with my hand as I typed away.

During this time I contact my costume designer, the amazing Elizabeth Whiting, and my long time musical collaborator Robbie Ellis.

I choose songs and get advice from Robbie, then he arranges the music and it is recorded live with a quintet. And in this case with a lutist in Italy.

Then I have two weeks of half day rehearsals and voila, a show.

CM: It’s been a while since we did a Q&A with you, maybe a decade ago when you were performing in Edinburgh. Can you tell us a little about what you have been up to since then?
PA: I am always touring somewhere.

During that pesky pandemic with NZ borders closed, I was lucky to be constantly touring around NZ. I started a podcast about menopause during lockdowns as I was fucking furious we hadn’t been taught about it.

I am lucky that I have carved out a full time career of solo performance for 25 years now.

CM: Your job description, according to your website is “Poet, MC, Comedienne, Actor, Social Commentator, TV Presenter, Voice Over Artist, Improviser, Wedding Celebrant, Podcaster and all round show off”. I presume you enjoy the eclectic nature of your work, but do you have a favourite thing to do?
PA: My job description could also be described as “doing whatever the fuck I can to make money and keep afloat”. I am lucky to be able to do many things. A Jill of all trades as it were.

Sometimes that can be frustrating in that people love a pigeon hole and ignore you if you don’t comply. But it has done me well in aforementioned 25 year career with no day job.

I really do enjoy all of it, but really love character work, be it onstage or a ‘Power Rangers’ or ‘Path Of Exile’ monster voice.

CM: What would you say have been the highlights of your working life thus far?
PA: I sound like a broken record but it’s still working in the industry and managing to discover what audiences want to see and aligning what I want to do with that.

I also recently directed my first adaptation of a large scale theatre piece, ‘Sense And Sensibility’. It was excruciating at times, I got a face rash and lost weight, but 5500 people saw it and the feedback was so joyous, it made me cry.

And not just in frustration.

CM: What aims and ambitions do you have for the future?
PA: To be a full-time performer for as long as my oestrogen depleting limbs will allow.

CM: Are the dates at Camden Fringe part of a wider tour? What’s next for this show?
PA: As mentioned, I am always on tour. This year I am hiring fifteen theatres in four countries.

As it’s Jane Austen’s 250th birthday, in NZ we have been touring our improv musical ‘Austen Found’. I toured ‘Promise & Promiscuity’ to Australia for a month.

I just did the ‘The Tempestuous’ in Winnipeg Fringe and am in Camden plus The Stavely Roundhouse in the Lakes, before heading back home for more ‘Austen Found’ and ‘Tempestuous’!

CM: What’s coming up next for you after this? Do you have new projects planned?
PA: I have been wanting to do a solo cabaret show called ‘Show Us Your Glitz’ for a decade now. A one woman show where I play all the characters in the comeback TV special for Ginger Starr. Her evil Mum, her country singer friend, the bad comic, etc.

I just have to kick my arse and write it. Writing is actually my least favourite part of all of it. It’s also daunting doing something not based on a long dead literary writer.

If you told me this after I dropped English like a stone at university, I would have been astonished.

Penny Ashton’s show ‘The Tempestuous’ is on Old Red Lion Theatre from 7-9 Aug as part of Camden Fringe. For more information and to book see the Camden Fringe website here.

LINKS: hotpink.co.nz