The Scotsman Fringe First Awards week two - Youth in Flames - video Dailymotion

The Scotsman Fringe First Awards week two - Youth in Flames

Transcript

00:00This is Mimi Martin, who is writer and performer in Youth in Flames. Hi Mimi.

00:10Hi.

00:11So your play is based in Hong Kong, where I believe you live. So could you tell me a little bit about that?

00:16Yes, so I grew up in Hong Kong from 10 to 18 before I moved back to London for drama training.

00:21And I wrote this play encapsulating my teenage experiences growing up there,

00:26but also the mass political shift that I witnessed, not only in 2014, but also 2019.

00:31And in 2019, China started extraditing criminals over to the mainland.

00:35But criminals loosely just meant anybody who was a journalist or anybody who was pro-democratic.

00:41And there was a lot of the youth who were on the forefront protesting for change.

00:46So it's a true story about the media censorship, the Chinese propaganda

00:51and Britain's very passive response to countries they have colonial ties with,

00:55which unfortunately is now a direct reflection of a society we currently live in.

01:00And I just wanted to shed a light on that and I wanted to say it through the lens of myself,

01:05a very ignorant British expat, because that was calling myself into question in that

01:12and what role I had to play.

01:14And how does it feel to have won a fringe first with this play?

01:18Yeah, I mean, overwhelming.

01:24This is my first time writing a play, my first time producing, not my first time acting,

01:30but, you know, a lot of fringe first all round.

01:33So it's incredibly exciting.

01:35It's definitely making me excited for the future that the show has.

01:39I can't wait to see what the next steps happen.

01:41And also just to be in the bubble of Edinburgh, Edinburgh Fringe,

01:45what this festival represents.

01:48Yeah, it's truly an honour.

01:49Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:50Great. Well, thank you so much and congratulations.

01:51Thank you so much.

01:53And.