The Lost Letters of Cathy G
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"Sweet story of 60's love" - Sarah Millican
"Genuinely touching and amusing, a real charming hour" - Time Out "Innocently Sweet and very funny" - ThreeWeeks "I saw it at the Fringe. A jolly tale with a melancholic tinge. And some sharp shirting" – John Hegley. Whilst in a junk shop, looking for photographs of families he'd never met, Paul stumbled across a wad of forgotten letters, lost since the 60’s. Spanning across America, France and Edgware, Paul dusted off these lost letters of hopeful groupies and first loves to produce a fantastic show in 2010. He then went on to find some of the authors of the letters and the show returned to The Edinburgh Festival in 2013 and was even more popular. It has also been performed at London’s Leicester Square Theatre and Canal Café Theatre.
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What people said about it
Alice Harrold - ThreeWeeks
Letter writing is the old timey way of sharing Facebook statuses from over the course of a week to ten days, comedian Paul Harry Allen explains, as he uses letters to bring his audience on a trip through the 1960s in this charmingly funny show. By riffling through the correspondences of one Cathy G during her formative years, which he happened upon in a junk shop, he entices the audience to join him in his obsession with the lives of strangers. Innocently sweet and very funny, Allen manages to enthrall his audience in the summer loves of this girl and the characters that she comes across, to give a nostalgic and engaging look at our histories.
Rating: 4/5
Click here to read original review and hear the Podcast Extra
Letter writing is the old timey way of sharing Facebook statuses from over the course of a week to ten days, comedian Paul Harry Allen explains, as he uses letters to bring his audience on a trip through the 1960s in this charmingly funny show. By riffling through the correspondences of one Cathy G during her formative years, which he happened upon in a junk shop, he entices the audience to join him in his obsession with the lives of strangers. Innocently sweet and very funny, Allen manages to enthrall his audience in the summer loves of this girl and the characters that she comes across, to give a nostalgic and engaging look at our histories.
Rating: 4/5
Click here to read original review and hear the Podcast Extra
National Theatre of Wales
Touchingly told with real intimacy, The Lost Letters of Cathy G is a journey through the real-life love letters of teenager Cathy G, rediscovered by Paul Harry Allen in a chart shop. Granting a new perspective on the 1960's, the show is perfectly suited to the Free Fringe, and is the sort of production you go up to Edinburgh to find.
Paul Harry Allen has gone into real detail in order to tell this journey, giving us letters from a string of wooers on Cathy's behalf, as well as pen-pals and friends, photographs and music. His storytelling is superb, he has a real understanding and warmth for each of the people in the story, which soon rubs off on the audience. It's incredible how much of a person's character we can sense in their writing, and you do can a real sense of sadness that letter writing is on its way out after watching the show.
From France to America, from Edgware to Wales, from Jimi Hendrix and Cat Stevens to Mrs Miller, the show travels far in very little time. An absolute pleasure to watch, this is easily top of my Free Fringe list, if not my Edinburgh list.
Here's a little interview with the man himself:
Cathy G - Paul Harry Allen
Touchingly told with real intimacy, The Lost Letters of Cathy G is a journey through the real-life love letters of teenager Cathy G, rediscovered by Paul Harry Allen in a chart shop. Granting a new perspective on the 1960's, the show is perfectly suited to the Free Fringe, and is the sort of production you go up to Edinburgh to find.
Paul Harry Allen has gone into real detail in order to tell this journey, giving us letters from a string of wooers on Cathy's behalf, as well as pen-pals and friends, photographs and music. His storytelling is superb, he has a real understanding and warmth for each of the people in the story, which soon rubs off on the audience. It's incredible how much of a person's character we can sense in their writing, and you do can a real sense of sadness that letter writing is on its way out after watching the show.
From France to America, from Edgware to Wales, from Jimi Hendrix and Cat Stevens to Mrs Miller, the show travels far in very little time. An absolute pleasure to watch, this is easily top of my Free Fringe list, if not my Edinburgh list.
Here's a little interview with the man himself:
Cathy G - Paul Harry Allen
