At this year’s Edinburgh Fringe, a new wave of performers is redefining stage endurance by integrating high-intensity physical training directly into their shows. Megan Tomei, the creator and star of SpinQueen™, leads a performance that functions as a high-intensity spin class. Under bright pink lights, she channels a character obsessed with thinness and toxic positivity, shouting, “We take the thing you’re running from, and turn it into fuel!” to her audience.
The physical toll on these performers is significant. Connor Delves, who stars in the cycling-focused play Cadel: Lungs on Legs, cycles 27km during every performance. The show is a tribute to Cadel Evans, the first Australian to win the Tour de France, and Delves uses the actual bikes Evans rode during his 2011 victory, which are maintained by Delves’s father. The intensity of the performance has drawn unusual attention from the audience, with some viewers asking to touch his calves after the show. Delves remains unfazed by the request, noting, “To make sure they’re real,” and adding, “If they’re OK with getting their hands sweaty, go for it.”
Delves, who grew up in a cycling-centric family in Perth, Western Australia, views the production as a way to merge his interests in acting and sport. He decided to create a show where he would be irreplaceable after being passed over for a role in a previous production. Preparing for the role required a complete lifestyle shift, including quitting alcohol and focusing intensely on nutrition and sleep. He emphasizes that the project requires treating acting with the same discipline as being an elite athlete.
Ben Norris, the writer and performer of The Distance, explores a different side of athletic ambition. His show focuses on the “also-rans”—the talented sportspeople who fall just short of professional success. Inspired by his own teenage years as an international long-distance runner, Norris portrays a young athlete dreaming of the Olympics. During the show, he runs at high speeds while maintaining dialogue, often drenched in sweat by the end. He notes that the physical struggle is intentional, explaining, “You’re watching it cost something. You’re watching this body really work.”
The tradition of treadmill-based performance art has a history at the festival, most notably with Richard Gadd’s 2016 Edinburgh comedy award-winning show Monkey See Monkey Do, which addressed themes of toxic masculinity and sexual assault. Decades prior, performance artist Kim Noble also utilized a treadmill as a central element of his work. Current performers are continuing this trend, though they face the constant risk of injury. Delves compares the lack of understudies to the reality of the Tour de France, where a single fall can end a race.
Maintaining health during the festival is a priority for these actors. Tomei, who cycles 16km per show, travels with a massage gun to manage the physical strain of her performance. Both she and Norris highlight the psychological aspects of their work, with Norris noting the “ambition monster” that drives athletes to push past their limits, even when running on empty. He even jokingly muses about his own potential for the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics, asking, “Is it too late?”
Audiences can catch these performances throughout the remainder of the festival. SpinQueen™ is running at the Jade Studio at Greenside @ George Street until 29 August. The Distance is being performed at the Main Hall at Summerhall until 31 August. Cadel: Lungs on Legs is at the Auditorium at Gilded Balloon at the Museum until 30 August, with a subsequent run at London’s Riverside Studios from 13 October to 15 November. The report also notes that b lood and sweat drip to the floor. The report also notes that in a small room in Edinburgh, Megan Tomei is cleat-clipped into a stationary bike, yelling above the music as she leads a high-intensity spin class gone wrong. The report also notes that the pain of failure, and the escape from reality, a profoundly fit group of actors are pushing themselves to their physical limits, employing various bikes and a treadmill to authentically illustrate the struggle for success. The report also notes that his dad an international mountain-biker, his mum was a triathlete. The report also notes that “I’d never seen a play that showed endurance sport at its best,” he says, “where the sport is an actual effort.”. The report also notes that performance artist Kim Noble pounded away on a treadmill while the other half of their double act, Stuart Silver, played chess against the audience, two decades before. The report also notes that over lockdown, Katie Mitchell created eco-theatre show A Play for the Living in a Time of Extinction, with cyclists generating the show’s lights and sound. The report also notes that where the exercise is in the story as well as in the doing, but few shows that involve this kind of equipment are about sport.
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