Tell us about your show. Why should we go and see it?
‘Sirens’ is a fever dream of a sketch show, where we will lure our audience to a watery grave with our hypnotic songs and murderous comedy. Inspired by Alice in Wonderland, 1940’s coastal thrillers, Sally Rooney books and Techno, ‘Sirens’ wilI showcase Norris’s three act play ‘The Lighthouse’, which was written in a lockdown delirium. Parker is lucky enough to have a starring role as an ingenue pig and Norris looks forward to leaving the duo to become a serious playwright.
Are you flying solo or are you part of a team?
We are a comedy duo who have also been best friends for 13 beautiful/ arduous years depending on which one of us you ask. We met at drama school, share a birthday (26th February), a bath and sometimes a towel. We have a prop son called Judas who we abducted from a drama school production of The Caucasian Chalk Circle who rides around in the back of Norris’s clown car.
What are your hopes and dreams for the Fringe?
As it’s been four years since we’ve last been at the Fringe, we are genuinely hoping to just have a nice time.
What makes you laugh?
Anything by Julia Davis, Gail Platt from Coronation Street and Gillian McKeith.
What is it that made you a performer?
Norris comes from rich acting stock, her dad trained at RADA, but when he narrowly missed the opportunity to play Ken Barlow in Coronation Street, he retired and became a farmer. However, he still insisted on entering the house stage left, reciting his one line ‘fucking horses, have they never heard of a fucking field?’ and exiting through a trap door in a billow of smoke.
Sinead was not cool as a teenager and so went for the classic trope of being funny to avoid being bullied. This coping mechanism has developed into a career in comedy alongside seven years of therapy.
How will your audience think/feel differently after an hour in your company?
They will experience the whole gamut of emotions during our show, beginning with fear, moving into a relaxed state of laughter, the euphoric highs of arousal and ecstasy, rounding off with an aftermath of confusion and shame.
Whose show – apart from your own – are you looking forward to seeing at the Edinburgh Fringe?
Our son and musical comedian Huge Davies who we love very much, worry about constantly and who is a rising star.
What’s the most useful piece of advice you’ve been given?
Our agent told us to use less wigs and get rid of the squid hat from the show; we’ve limited the number of wigs but the squid hat remains.
Do you have a favourite Fringe memory?
Norris: Telling my dad we got a four star review in The Guardian and going on a ghost bus tour.
Parker: When a man who resembled a viking lifted me in the air like a barbell in the Pleasance Attic.
Who is your showbiz/Fringe idol and why.
Robbie the rickshaw driver who Sinead snogged in 2013, comes to all our shows and sometimes video messages us on facebook at 2am when he’s drunk.
Norris & Parker: Sirens, 9.15, Monkey Barrel 4, August, August 3-28
https://tickets.edfringe.com/whats-on/norris-and-parker-sirens
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