This week’s satchel comes stamped with an American postmark — because when a Fringe favourite crosses the Atlantic, it’s only right that Theatre Village is waiting at the mailbox
Well my darlings, you never quite know what the post will bring — and today my satchel has delivered a paperclip with a vengeance. Not the bent one holding together your gas bill, but that squiggly little fella who used to pop up in Microsoft Word and ask if you were writing a letter. Yes, Clippy! He’s escaped the recycling bin of history and re-emerged as the unlikely hero of Douglas Widick’s musical Paperclip, which has just landed three final performances at none other than the iconic SoHo Playhouse in New York City.
Now, if you were buzzing around Edinburgh this August (as yours truly most certainly was), you might’ve spotted Widick stapling himself into the Fringe fabric with over 25 shows in his back pocket. Fest Magazine, never shy of a quip, hailed Paperclip as “a very humorous show with a very likeable and talented performer.” Quite right too — the lad has stage energy fizzing like a can of Irn-Bru shaken on the Royal Mile.
But before he was transforming office supplies into musical heroes, Douglas Widick’s CV was already a postbag full of eclectic delights. Would you believe his career first took off in 1999 when he beat Rosie O’Donnell at Harry Potter trivia live on her own show? (I’d pay good postage to see her face when that happened.) From there he strummed his way through pop-punk outfit Easton, even playing the 2006 Warped Tour alongside Mayday Parade, before sharpening his comedy chops at UCB and then touring internationally with hip-hop improv group North Coast. He’s like a man who refuses to stay stapled down.
Paperclip itself is a quirky cocktail of time travel, techno-panic, and redemption. Imagine this: Clippy, once the most mocked of all digital icons, has glimpsed a terrifying future where artificial intelligence takes over everything. So what does a helpful office assistant do? He hops through the wormholes of the internet, trying to stop humanity from tripping over its own floppy disks. Douglas himself says the show is really about “choice, self-sabotage, and how we engage with a rapidly changing world.” Translation: it’s funny, it’s sharp, and it just might make you feel a little less guilty about ignoring your own Word documents.
Oh, and did I mention that for these New York dates, Clippy has a live backing band? Yes, that’s right — the paperclip’s packing percussion, and I hear the guitars shred harder than a misfed printer.
So if you’re Stateside and fancy watching a Microsoft relic reinvent himself as a musical messiah, SoHo Playhouse is the place to post yourself. Just don’t expect him to help you draft your CV — Clippy’s got bigger glitches to fix.
Grace’s Verdict: A show that’s half nostalgia trip, half internet fever dream, and all heart. Consider this one properly stamped and sealed.
And for our pals across the pond — consider this your stamped-and-sealed greeting from Theatre Village. Normally I’d sign off with a tidy “cheerio” and be off on my rounds, but since we’re in New York… welp, guess I’d better switch gears. So here goes: hey y’all, this show is totally awesome, you should most definitely go check it out, okay? (How did I do? Did I sound local?) Anyway, wherever you’re reading from — Edinburgh, Essex, or the Empire State — Grace’s satchel delivers to all zip codes.
https://ci.ovationtix.com/35583/production/1250921
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