Noam Tomaschoff’s life took an unexpected turn when a casual DNA test revealed family secrets that would change everything. Now, he’s bringing that journey to the Edinburgh Fringe in his award-winning solo musical Our Little Secret: The 23andMe Musical. Playing at the Gilded Balloon Patter Hoose, this deeply personal show explores themes of identity, family, and the impact of long-held secrets.
“I think the best way to tell you about the show is to tell you about myself,” Tomaschoff begins. “I am from Toronto, Canada. And I grew up as an only child.” He recounts his early love for theatre, nurtured by supportive parents and friendships forged through high school musicals. This foundation would prove crucial when faced with life-altering news at age 31.
The catalyst for Our Little Secret came from an offhand conversation about DNA testing. “I told my mom that I ordered a DNA test,” Tomaschoff explains. “She had a very strange reaction to this. She was like, sort of down about it. She was like, what’s the point of that? Like, what? Why would you want to do that? Weird.”
This reaction led to a revelation that would upend Tomaschoff’s understanding of his family. “The next day, my parents sat me down. And my dad told me that he’s not my biological father,” he shares. “They had to tell me, they were never going to tell me but they had to because they knew I had ordered the test.”
Turning this profound personal experience into a musical was a natural choice for Tomaschoff. “I said, there’s a high chance that other people know that their donor conceived and have done something like this and have done some digging,” he recalls of his thought process. The resulting journey of discovery forms the heart of Our Little Secret.
The show’s development was a collaborative effort, reuniting Tomaschoff with his high school musical theatre friends. “I went to the guys, and they were like, Let’s do a musical. That’s what we like to do,” he says. This team effort resulted in a show that balances humour and heart, using music to convey the complex emotions of Tomaschoff’s experience.
Our Little Secret isn’t just about Tomaschoff’s specific story, however. He emphasizes its universal themes: “It’s not just like, hey, come here, my cool story. Yeah, the specifics are my story. But what has emerged is actually a story about any family going through something potentially traumatic, and how a family can process something.”
The solo format presents both opportunities and challenges for Tomaschoff. “I feel really, really comfortable interacting with the audience and having the audience as the only partner,” he explains. However, he notes the physical demands of the performance: “The challenging part of it is that it is a vocally demanding show. And I’m lucky to have been able to craft the songs to my voice. But it’s still challenging because we want to hit the heights as well.”
As Our Little Secret makes its Edinburgh Fringe debut, Tomaschoff reflects on the festival’s significance. “Edinburgh Fringe is, I think 20 or 30 times bigger than Toronto Fringe. So it’s, I don’t even know, I’m not even comparing that,” he muses. Despite the scale, he’s approaching the Fringe with a mix of preparation and openness to the unexpected.
Our Little Secret: The 23andMe Musical promises to be a unique Fringe experience, offering audiences a chance to reflect on their own family dynamics through Tomaschoff’s deeply personal yet universally resonant story. As he puts it, “We all have families, and we all go through stuff. And there’s a way to do that. That, you know, just takes advantage of our better nature, as opposed to our more defensive and fearful nature.”
Our Little Secret: The 23andMe Musical runs from 31st July to 26th August (not 7th, 12th, 13th, 20th) at 17:30 at Gilded Balloon Patter Hoose (Doonstairs).
