Now then, you know how we at Theatre Village love a good story – especially when it’s got guts, grit, and a woman refusing to stay silent. Well, hold onto your lanyards, because Elis Pear is about to take Edinburgh by storm with a debut solo show that doesn’t tiptoe around the truth. It kicks the door in.
Bitter Baby is Elis’s raw, unfiltered and fiercely intelligent one-woman play, shining a spotlight on what happens when academia, sex work, autism and identity all crash into each other – and it’s not a neat collision. It’s messy. It’s brave. And it’s exactly the kind of show Theatre Village exists to shout about.
Elis, a Brazilian-born academic, autistic woman, and all-round powerhouse, lays bare what it was like to chase a PhD in London while living a double life just to get by. In a world that wasn’t built for her, she did what many do in silence: she survived. And now she’s telling that story – not with pity, but with piercing humour, poetic honesty, and not a sugar-coating in sight.
“Bitter Baby is the show I never thought I’d write—but always knew I needed to,” says Elis. “It’s about shame, guilt, survival—and what happens when you finally dare to speak.”
Well, speak she does – and thank goodness for it. This is theatre that demands listening, laughs nervously in the dark, and walks you straight into its truths with a knowing wink.
Making her Edinburgh Fringe debut, Elis brings a voice that’s long overdue on our stages – one that speaks not only for herself but for the neurodivergent, the immigrants, the sex workers, the scholars, the survivors. She’s not here to be polite. She’s here to be heard.
And we at Theatre Village? We’re very much here for it.
Catch Bitter Baby this August – and don’t be surprised if it lingers long after the lights go down.
Bitter Baby | Edinburgh Festival Fringe
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