Adam Robertson spoke with Shetland-born comedian Marjolein Robertson on the 10 things that changed her life.
Her show O, which retells a traumatic experience whereupon she almost died after suffering a haemorrhage while on her period and is the second show of a trilogy, is coming to this year's Fringe - tickets are available HERE.
1. The miracle of life
FOR me, the miracle of life came from my living room looking through our rectangular window and my dad had his hand up a sheep. I remember my mam saying, “Why is he wearing his best shirt?”.
It was genuinely the first time I ever saw anything to do with birth. This sheep outside my window and my mam was telling me it would be good to see. The lamb died, I watched the sheep eat the placenta and I didn’t know what that was. I thought it was maybe the twin.
It was my "spider-bite" moment. A lot of people grew up on crofts, you’re surrounded by this and it’s a matter of life and death.
2. The Young Ones
I LOVED watching something so funny, silly, anarchic and surreal. I think it’s one of the first funny TV shows I remember sitting down watching with my family. I couldn’t really believe I was allowed, to be honest.
Some of the humour is on the edge, it’s so rough and violent. Everyone in my family loved it and I watched them all laugh at it. It was so off the wall. When I watched that, I thought it was so creative and funny.
3. Shetland
PEOPLE often say, “oh I bet it was hard getting into comedy when you lived in Shetland”. There’s this idea that nothing happens in a small community but actually, everything does because you make your own fun.
So we put on our own music nights, we had our own events. People would come together and do character-based sketches. There’s a huge part of the Up Helly Aa festival that people aren’t aware of, for example.
After the procession and singing the songs and everything, the rest of the night you go to halls or a venue of some kind, and all the people in the procession are in groups called squads and the whole point is they go from venue to venue performing an act.
It might be a dance or magic trick but it’s most often a sketch and it’ll be about something in popular culture or in the local community.
We have this tongue-in-cheek way of making fun of ourselves and looking back on things. There’s always been an inherent humour and that’s had a huge impact on me. Watching your local baker or minister getting together to perform this hilarious sketch, it was just the most deadpan people being brilliant.
Even when I didn’t think of doing comedy professionally, performing was always something that we did.
4. Having a terrible time
AFTER university, I worked as a town planner and my life was kind of set in front of me where I was saving for a mortgage and get put through my postgrad. But on a whim, my boyfriend was moving to Amsterdam at the time so I moved with him.
In Amsterdam, I had to leave my well-paying job and chance of getting a property. We were kicked out of a flat overnight because it turned out we were illegally subletting so ended up on friends’ floors. We didn’t have a bed.
And then my boss who I had in Amsterdam in this restaurant tried to pay me half the normal wage and when I asked about it, I was fired and was unemployed for ages. We found somewhere to move in and I thought things will get better but then we were robbed.
It was one thing after another.
5. Easy Laughs
WHENEVER I had any money in Amsterdam, I would go to this drop-in improv workshop at a place called Easy Laughs. It does shows and teaches comedy. That’s how I got into stand-up.
I had a terrible time but it led to Easy Laughs taking pity on me and getting onto their stand-up course. I was homeless, unemployed, robbed and the comedy course thought, "well, you’ve had a hard time so come try this".
It was a weekly meet-up and we’d talk about different kinds of jokes and all different styles of comedy. We’d have to come up with material to try in front of everyone.
I don’t think you have to do a course but I can’t imagine how I would have got into comedy without one because as soon as I finished, I moved back to Shetland. The most valuable thing you can do is go watch comedy in clubs but also new material nights with a mix of new acts and professionals.
After that course finished, I couldn’t see that as much so I had at least had that discipline of just writing every week even if it wasn’t to perform and I could hold onto that in Shetland because there’s no stand-up nights as such.
6. The fiddle
I LOVED fiddle as we are all required to play in Shetland as well as fish. It makes you go on stage and feel so vulnerable.
But also through playing, I eventually played in the Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo because they had the Shetland fiddlers.
Playing that meant going to Edinburgh every August and immerse myself in the Fringe then run to the castle and play and go watch more shows afterwards. When I wasn’t drunk anyway.
7. A mind-reader
WHEN I was playing the Tattoo, I went to see a show but accidentally went to see a mind-reader. In the show, he read my mind and I was wondering whether I should leave Shetland to go into comedy and writing and he said “yes”.
He told me to go back and look through my old university notebook where I used to write ideas and stories and follow that. A mind-reader told me to go do a Fringe show so I did it.
8. My Dad
HE used to study in Edinburgh in the 1960s. He lived there from about 1959 to 1974 and ever since I was a bairn, he’d tell me stories about the Fringe and all these amazing acts.
He saw people like Rowan Atkinson (above) and would talk about all the shows.
It sounded like this magical world and I always wondered about going there myself, not even be involved.
9. Edinburgh Fringe
I WOULD spend all year writing jokes, practising them to my poor brother and sister and mam and dad. Everyone would give me feedback. Really, quite brutal honest feedback but that was good. And then I would go do the Fringe every year, it was such a draw.
I’m lucky because I have pals from Shetland living in Edinburgh so I could afford to stay with them. I don’t know how people can afford to do it now if they don’t have someone to stay with.
I would save up 11 months of the year and all my holidays, I’d sometimes quit a job but then I’d go do it. So the Fringe is something that enticed me into comedy and through that I thought I want to do this all the time.
10. Almost dying
ONE time I had a period when I was 16 that was so bad I should have died. I thought why was this and how could I help other people, so I’ve written a show to raise awareness for other people.
I’m a female comedian as well so it’s my duty to talk about periods on stage and make it funny in some way.
I didn’t think about doing comedy till my mid-20s. The first time I considered writing it as a stand-up show was in January 2020.
It was going to be that show that year. Lockdown happened and I thought maybe that’s a sign from everyone not to do an hour about periods but I’ve learnt nothing and here it comes again.
