Julian Guassardo on ‘The Perils of Youth’
After the success of our 2025 Camden Fringe Interviews, we thought it only right to attempt a repeat for 2026. So throughout July we published over 60 interviews to give a taste of what to expect from London’s best fringe theatre festival. The plan was to stop there, but as shows are still coming to us asking for interviews, we thought we’d do a few more! But we have to stop soon, we’re also very busy seeing the shows now.
You can find out more about Camden Fringe, along with details of every show playing here. You can also find all of this year’s interviews at here.
Pitching itself at the intersection of Edgar Allan Poe, Inside No.9, and Grand Guignol, The Perils of Youth; or The Gall of the House of Sud is a dark, absurd plunge into the subterranean depths of the subconscious. Written by and starring Julian Guassardo alongside Maggie Rose, the play examines family dynamics, cyclic trauma, and the chaotic bonds between a mother and son. Following dates at Barons Court Theatre, the production moves to the Rosemary Branch Theatre later this month for two more performances.
Julian sat down with us to discuss turning forgotten monologues into stage art, dark psychological humour, and setting fire to your dignity for fringe theatre.
If you had to describe the vibe of your show in just one sentence, what would it be and how does it manifest on stage?
Edgar Allan Poe meets Inside No.9 meets Grand Guignol… The blackest comedy – and a portal into a subterranean world of the psyche. Fun for all the family!
Why is 2026 the perfect time for this show to be seen?
It’s an archetypal, timeless piece, set in an archaic locale, somewhere in the bowels of the subconscious. It’s about breaking the cycles and chains of the past; incarnation and reincarnation. So it applies to all times I guess. Is that cheating?
What was the ‘eureka moment’ that made you realise this story had to be told right now?
When a playwright gave me the ending, and I realised I’d actually accidentally somehow written a work of art that could speak to deep seated, hidden family and psycho dynamics, completely by accident.
Is this version how you originally envisioned it or has it changed drastically since you first put pen to paper?
I wrote an unperformable dialogue between two vanquished voices in the dark ten years ago, and promptly forgot all about it. The thing beat away in my subconscious for ten years, like Jumanji, then I shared it with a playwright, who encouraged me to turn it into a radio piece, from which it evolved into this whacky, absurdist stageplay. I’m new to plays and acting, so it’s a fantastic experiment to see what we can get away with.
What is it about your character that you most enjoy?
The Son is a mad hatter, a tramping, raving distillation of self-torment, vanity and thwarted, vaunting masculine ambition, or as his mother describes him, ‘a beached walrus preening and belching in the bitter dawn of a frozen arctic morn’. The Mother is Miss Havisham if she survived the fire. These two ‘warped and weary souls’ are archetypal characters stretched to their limits… Everything they say is either a lie, preposterous hyperbole, or a barbed insult to cut the other as deeply as possible whilst making them laugh. Their language is so archaic, rhythmic, and Shakespearian and just plain fun to vocalise for laughs. It’s been an absolute gas playing them both.
How challenging has this role been for you?
Turning this from an unperformable slab of rhythmic, poetic soliloquy into a radio play and then into a stage play, balancing the needs of drama; undulating and escalating action and tension, with the unique quality of the language and sentences that run on whilst holding the audience’s attention, has been the most challenging and rewarding aspect of the development process. An archetypal psychodrama that doesn’t pull its punches; Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf dunked in black tar.
Thanks to director Micky Gibbons, Jack Firman our lighting person, and the phenomenal work of the lead, Maggie Rose, we’ve managed to give the audience a rollicking theatrical ride. Is it about death, birth, literature, mothers and sons, patriarchy, hammering sticks into the ground…? And can we get away with a whole show about who is going to answer the fucking front door?!
What does “success” look like for you this August, beyond just selling tickets?
The audience to leave going ‘what the hell did I just see?’
If you had to describe your show as a colour what would it be?
Blood red. It’s a show about the human body, where trauma, history, ghosts, and the vapours of the past reside. ‘The blood my son, the blood…’
If you had to describe your show as a meal what would it be?
Bitter, dark, rich gruel. Marmite for the soul, brought to you by The Weird Sisters.
If you could perform this show anywhere in the world?
At a Tracey Emin exhibition. There are strong themes of womanhood, motherhood, loss and torment that speak to Emin’s extraordinary excavation of the female experience.
If your show was a drink at the venue bar, what would be the ingredients?
Whatever Edgar Allan Poe was drinking the night before he died. (Poor sod!)
Write a one-sentence “fake” review of the show…
Grandmother’s Weekly: “This disgraceful, unholy pisstake of a play should never be seen by upstanding, civic-minded young people. Avoid The Perils of Youth like the plague. And bring me a cup of tea!”
What words of advice/encouragement would you give anyone thinking about doing Camden Fringe next year?
JUST DO IT. Set fire to your dreams, your bank account and your dignity and be rewarded with the satisfaction of creating real art for an engaged audience who want you to take risks.
You can read our review of the show during its Barons Court dates here.
Many thanks to Julian for the chat. The Perils of Youth will play at Rosemary Branch Theatre on Friday 28 and Sunday 30 August as part of Camden Fringe.
