Across Generations and Across Continents: Beth Paterson’s Journey with Niusia

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One of the joys of the Fringe is seeing shows travel halfway around the world to land in Edinburgh, and Beth Paterson has done just that with Niusia—a piece that began life in Melbourne, made a stop in Adelaide Fringe, and now finds itself right here among the madness of August in Scotland.

Niusia isn’t your average family tale. Beth’s grandmother was a Holocaust survivor, but the legacy she left behind was more silence than story. What Beth has created is a show stitched together from memories, fragments, and all the questions she wasn’t allowed to ask. It’s tender, sharp, and unflinchingly curious, and has scooped up a few five-star reviews along the way.

When I sat down with Beth, we talked about the adventure of hauling a show across continents, the strange hand-me-down nature of cultural identity and how a play about one woman’s absence can spark connection for so many people in one room.

TRANSCRIPT

(0:00 - 4:54)

Hello, I'm Ruth and I'm the Arts Business. A couple of weeks ago, I met the lovely Beth Patterson and we spoke about her show, Niasia. A couple of moments in this video go a little bit funky, so I'll do my best to fill in the gaps.

Hi, I'm Ruth and I'm the Arts Business. I'm here with Beth from Niasia, who is going to tell us all about her show. So let's start off by telling people what it's about, Beth.

Absolutely. So Niasia, that is the name of my show and the name of my late grandmother. There she is, right there, Niasia.

Niasia is a one-woman verbatim work, all about the difficult relationships that can exist between daughters, mothers and grandmothers. My grandmother was a Holocaust survivor and she was heroic. She saved people's lives in the camp by smuggling medication out in her vagina.

Wow. And when she came to Australia, she was like a ball-busting businesswoman. She could throw one hell of a party and I remember her as a massive bitch.

So the show is about how all of those things can be true at once and it's also a look into a version of the diaspora story because I didn't go to a Jewish school. I went to an Anglican school and I had really very little connection with my Jewish heritage and history. Did you know you were Jewish? Yes and no.

Like I wore a Star of David for a long time but I picked that up because I remember rifling through my mum's jewellery and picking up and asking what it was and she said her father gave it to her when she was 12 which would have been her bat mitzvah and my mother adored her father and so when I wore it for me it was actually a connection to my grandfather rather than a connection to the love that I could see that was in my mother's eyes for this man. So I kind of knew I was Jewish but I didn't really know what that meant for a very long time and so the show really looks at what it is to form a connection to culture and history and heritage when it was so abruptly severed from you and it covers dark material but there's a lot of humour through it. How's the response been so far? Really good, really really good.

It's a very funny show like there's a lot of humour through it and audiences, we make quite an effort to invite the audience along with us because I sort of straddle the worlds of like non-Jewish and Jewish at the same time so I really bring the audience on a journey with me so it is not a show for the Jewish community by any stretch of the imagination like it is but it also isn't and so sometimes the audiences don't really know if they're allowed to laugh because I make some pretty up-the-nose jokes but I bring them with me so whether they come with me or not it's a bit varied but often the response has been beautiful in that I've had people come and thank me for putting a show on that reflects their experience and they don't have to be Jewish for that. You don't sound like you're from Andermere so where have you come from? Melbourne, Australia otherwise known as Naam which is the Wurundjeri word for that country. I went to, I was there last year, I went to a big Aboriginal exhibition in the art gallery, it's really cool.

It's sensational. Why did you decide to bring it all the way from Australia to here? All the way, lots of reasons. We really want this work to have a life and we know that the Edinburgh Fringe Festival is the largest open access festival in the world and it's often a marketplace for people to jump off and to sort of start relationships for touring and to sort of take the work to the next level.

Ideally we'd love to be able to break into the curated festival circuit but we knew that biggest festival, open access festival in the world, we'd won a couple awards in Adelaide but we took it to Adelaide with Edinburgh in our scope, in our crosshairs, in our vision. I think it's quite accessible for a lot of people if it's it's a grandmother-daughter right which everyone has and it's a story about I assume how difficult it has been to be Jewish in past times. Yes, yes, we do sort of, we nod to, in the world of the work we do nod to the events of the last couple of years but it is very much of the world of the play.

I speak to intercultural rebellion and resistance but not in a way that alienates or hijacks the work we've made because I started writing this in 2019 and we actually premiered this work during Melbourne Fringe of 2023 between the dates of the 2nd and the 8th of October. Nice. So the world started, the show started in one world and the show ended in another world.

Yeah, yeah, of course. Oh, tough. What do you do for a living? I assume you're a theatre creator? I'm a theatre maker but to make money, haha, back in Melbourne I've got a couple jobs.

(4:54 - 5:25)

I'm a mental health care worker. Oh, amazing. So I work with people in the community who are on Australian system called the NDIS which is the National Insurance Disability Scheme.

So people who have, who experience disability have a whole bunch of different varieties and extremities. They're given funds through a programme so they can access community and try and reduce barriers. So I work with people who have mental, really severe mental illness.

(5:25 - 5:39)

But I'm also a Captain Starlight which means I jump around the hospital with other clowns and singers. Oh, that's so fun. And I play a character named Captain Starlight or Captain Koala for me and we entertain and bring some light and life to kids who are doing it tough in the hospital.

(5:39 - 9:31)

Yeah, wow. What sort of budget were you looking at for this show and how did you fund it to bring it over here? We applied for a heck tonne of grants. None of them came through.

So it's all independently funded. So coming from Australia it's a very expensive endeavour. Flights over here are worth an arm and a leg.

So there was flights a month and a bit's worth of accommodation. The venue, flyering, all the shebang. I'm thinking personally I'm dropping about anywhere between twenty and twenty-five thousand dollars on the festival.

Australian, which is what, twelve and a half thousand pounds. Which is probably about right for the festival at the moment. And you're in a good venue in terms of they do a lot of diverse work here and you must be with fellow artists who are in the same boat and you can meet and network with a lot of people in Summerhall which you can't necessarily do in other places.

What has been the hardest part of your preparation to get here? Hardest part? Parting with a lot of money. With a hope in my pocket. With a dream on my arm.

Whatever that phrase is. Maybe I've made it up, I don't know. I love it.

We'll run with it. We'll run with it. Also having to, because my show is compact and tourable, but still having to contend with wearing so many hats.

Having to think about building a design that works for a space that we've never seen and we won't get to see until we get in there. In a way that maintains the integrity of the design and the work that we've built to date. Having to think about sourcing props and sets in a place that we don't know where we're going to get on our own money.

And that real question of what if I don't spend that extra money? What if that makes the difference between me reaching a particular contact or not? So it's the nebulous nature of parting with money and having to be a production manager and be a marketing manager and an actor and a writer. My show, because I've worked it in so well, me getting up and performing this fairly involved work is the smallest part of the equation. And in terms of, you just touched on your marketing there, how do you deal with your flyering, social media, PR, all of that? Is that all you? No.

So I'm quite fortunate. We did pay the beautiful Colonial Consulting. So they're our PR team and they've been coordinating all kinds of interviews and our reviewers.

And so that's been a huge thing taken off me and my producer's plate. And as my producer, the incredible Arai Presentation, who's also brought kinder at Cowbate. Cowbate.

Underbelly Cowgate. But they are our nuisance producer as well. So they've done a huge amount of work at our social media presence and they've been managing all the liaising between the venues and printing and... And they're based in Edinburgh? No, they came over here as well.

So we're all like... What's going on? Is this what we look like? It's all feeling super dark. Yeah. What's your daily schedule look like on the average day of a fringe for you? Average day of a fringe.

So far, look, I did bring runners. They haven't come out of a suitcase. I wanted to try and run to keep my fitness up, but I landed in Edinburgh and became sick immediately as you can see.

I'm a bit nasal and a bit sinus-y, but I'm not contagious anymore. Yeah. You're the star of the fringe flu.

That's it. Everyone's going to get it now. I'm patient zero.

You're all welcome. So I get up, I make myself beans on toast. Nice.

(9:32 - 9:46)

I love beans. I also really like Marmite, I've discovered. I start a little gently... How does it compare to Vegemite? Very different consistency.

Marmite is quite goopy. Vegemite is more of a paste. Asking the important questions.

(9:46 - 12:14)

Very important. I start my warm-up, I do my makeup, I come here, I try to do some flyering. With Nusha, I found that I've been doing a lot of flyering.

He's just having conversations with people, asking what they want to see, because it's a much harder show to be standing in the meadows and be like, my grandma was a bitch, come see my show. I've had a lot less success doing that. But when I sit down with other people and be like, I see you're looking for a show, what kind of show do you want to see? It's a lot more of a process.

But I have seen people who I've spoken to come to the show, which is really nice. But I'll come here early to do some flyering. I'll warm up, get into the show, we'll pack it in, we'll pack it out.

And then I've got the afternoon, or find myself some lunch, catch some shows, talk to some other artists, see how they're going. And then I just see shows or I go hunker down. Do you have any advice for managing burnout? Know that you can perform at a bit sick, but also everyone's different.

Anyway, one of my tips, listen to yourself. There's always going to be things you're going to miss out on. And there are always going to be things that you should miss out on.

Just look after yourself. We're staying in Leith, which is definitely not in the heart of the city. And first I was like, no, I don't get to be in the hubbub.

But it turns out that's exactly what I needed. To be able to see all the shenanigans and be like, bye. And to retreat has been really, really important.

So know what you need and accommodate for that. Is this your first time in Edinburgh? Yes. So what do you wish you'd known before you came? What do I wish I'd known before I came? Great question.

Maybe it's too soon for me to know that yet. I think the only thing that really comes to mind is a bit entry level, I suppose, but how important the two for one sale days are. But it's not actually because now more people are only doing the partial run here.

And a lot of people do later on and they don't have that as an option because they're doing the next week or the week after. And I think that people do really benefit on two for one. This is the reason we come so early is for the two for one days.

Because otherwise it gets incredibly pricey. And you can see stuff that on an ordinary day, you'd be like £25 at the Edinburgh Fringe for one show, whereas if it's £12.50, you can get around it. Yeah, exactly.

(12:16 - 13:18)

What advice would you give to first timers thinking about setting up their own theatre show and going and doing a Fringe Festival? I think with any Fringe Festival, but particularly the Edinburgh Fringe, know exactly what you want out of the Fringe. You can sell out a show, you can make new friends, you can see as much stuff as you want, you can aim for a new archival and some new images, you can aim for buckets of reviews or to trial new stuff, but you can't do it all. You cannot do it all.

So be really particular about what you want out of a Fringe season and allow that to dictate your decisions. Allow that to help you identify what is going to be best venue for your show, how much money and what kind of marketing you use, the kind of relationships you build, how you filter, contacting industry, who you want to contact because you can't do it all. So know what you want and don't just go and be like, I'm just going to have a good time because if you try and do it all, you won't do any of it.

(13:18 - 13:30)

Yeah, absolutely. And finally, sum up your Fringe experience in one sentence. Oh, spectacular.

Eye-opening. I'm just picking singular words. I love it though.

(13:31 - 14:25)

Eye-opening, spectacular, terrifying, a microcosm. Nice. Where can audience find your show and keep in touch with you? Here I am at NUSA.

I am playing the former woman's locker room in this spectacular Summer Hall arts venue, which is downstairs at 1.20pm. It's an hour long show, tight 55, with the exception of the 11th and the 18th. You can find me on social media. If you look at Beth Patterson, interesting spelling, P-A-T-E-R-S-O-N, one T, 1, A-U-S, so Beth Patterson, Oz on Instagram, or A Ry Presentation, A-R-Y Presentation.

And you'll find us that way, or you can Google the show and I suppose you'll find us eventually. Amazing. Thank you so much for your time, Ruth.