Sometimes the title of a play doesn’t necessarily represent what it’s about, but I can’t for the life of me work out what inspired the name The Best Ideas Happen In The Toilet, Cláudia Saavedra’s debut play, which is playing at the Space Triplex this Edinburgh Fringe.
Sure, it opens with our protagonist urinating and getting a little annoyed that we’ve interrupted her flow, so to speak. The chair, labelled ‘this is a toilet’ plays no further part in proceedings, so perhaps the only thing that links back to that title is that this show is an hour of verbal diarrhoea.
There’s a vague attempt at a plot; Frankie moves to London to become an actress, somehow lands a job in sales (but doesn’t know what she’s selling). There’s a series of men, some other jobs and a lot of calling people bitches.
If that all sounds a bit vague, it’s because it is. This appears to be less of a one-person play and more of a one-person rant, and an aggressive one at that. I’m aware that Frankie is a character that Saavedra has created, and it’s one that is arrogantly self-centred and reeking of entitlement.
Creating an unlikable character to make a point is a fairly common device in theatre, but you do need to make the point, not just showcase the traits that make the character deplorable. It’s also fine to employ the tactic for comedic effect, but The Best Ideas Happen In The Toilet reminded me of the feeling of being constipated; no matter how hard I tried to force a laugh, nothing whatsoever would come out.
The show is very focussed on showing Frankie on the cusp of adulthood, but paints her as a petulant child; who finds time to insult almost every demographic, and at one point the audience are made to feel guilty for simply being there.
The thrust stage allowed me to observe those looks of bewilderment on the audiences faces switch to frustration.
Cláudia Saavedra’s delivery does little to lift her script, with the only really emotion surfacing when it’s time to insult someone. The whole thing is accompanied by some very bad sound effects, there are many shows at the Fringe operating on a shoe-string budget, but this one feels like it should be paying us to sit through it.
Already ten minutes over the advertised finish time, Frankie declares it’s the end of the play, which is met with considerable relief rather than disappointment, only for it to then continue with yet more ranting, nothing to tie up the numerous plot holes or to try and explain the piece, just another Twitter doom scroll of insults and moaning.
The Best Ideas Happen In The Toilet seems to have absolutely no idea what’s it trying to achieve, I still don’t know what the title refers to, but I think the best idea for this script would be to flush it.
