Lizzie Borden took an axe and overnight became America’s original ‘mad, bad and dangerous to know’ icon. In Bury The Hatchet, a razor-sharp true crime retelling, award-winning ensemble Out Of The Forest Theatre (The Brief Life & Mysterious Death of Boris III, King of Bulgaria) return to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe to reopen the infamous case with their signature dark humour.
Combining bluegrass murder ballads with satirical storytelling, Bury The Hatchet unpicks Lizzie Borden’s 1892 alleged crime and subsequent trial—America’s greatest ever unsolved murder mystery. Although acquitted, Lizzie was forever a condemned woman, her story written not by evidence but by the media’s hunger for scandal. When the public decides a woman’s fate before the jury, does the truth even matter?
Women in the spotlight remain our favourite bloodsport: if there’s one thing more lucrative than elevating a woman to untouchable heights, it’s the inevitable feeding frenzy when we rip her to shreds.
Writer and performer Sasha Wilson comments, “I like to think my plays are Trojan Horses for my politics – smuggled in under the guise of historical intrigue but carrying something far more contemporary. Bury The Hatchet isn’t just about whether Lizzie Borden did it. It’s about what we demand from women in the public eye. Because when the media shapes a narrative, it doesn’t just report the story – it devours it.”
Directed by Vicky Moran (Bangers, Bristol Old Vic; No Sweat, National Tour), this knee-slapping folk show fuses gallows humour and Vaudevillian horror. The cast includes Lawrence Boothman (Fiddler on the Roof, Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre), David Leopold (Late Company, Trafalgar Studios), and Sasha Wilson (Noises Off, Beck Centre for the Arts).
VAULT Award-winning and two-time Off West End Best Ensemble winners, Out Of The Forest Theatre return to the Fringe following critical acclaim for The Brief Life & Mysterious Death of Boris III, King of Bulgaria.
