Dogmouth Theatre presents 'Sluts With Consoles'.
Is that a joy-con in your pocket, or are you pleased to see us? Armed with plasmids, power-ups, and enough energy drinks to kill a small dog, Player One and Player Two are on a mission to uncover the truth about women in the gaming industry.
Inspired by real testimonies from women working within the industry, Sluts With Consoles is an anarchic, high energy, dark comedy created for the angsty, teenage girl inside us all. This is a show about videogames, the women who love them, and the community we wish loved us back.
Ahead of performances at the Lambeth Fringe we spoke to the team behind the show, Alice Flynn (writer/producer/player 2), Mia Harvey (player 1), Rachel Isobel Heritage (director), Cameron Moreton (TSM) and Joe Strickland (co-producer).
What can you tell me about your show?
A: Sluts With Consoles is fun, incredibly stupid, and a real joy to share with people. The show has been on a bit of a crazy journey as it's technically Dogmouth's debut show and we never really thought it would go further than VAULT Festival 2023. However, we've had such a delightful, unexpectedly warm response from audiences and critics alike, and it's really become a passion project for everyone involved. The show is peppered with little easter eggs, gaming inner jokes, nerdy references, and it is as much a love letter to nerd culture as it is a feminist critique of the gaming industry.
A: Multi-media, black comedy, absurdist are probably the three main categories it would go in. Think Wreck-It Ralph meets Barbie, meets Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life. If you're a nerd or you're a feminist, or better yet... a nerdy feminist, this is made for you.
Q: How have you approached developing the piece?
A: We sent out a survey in 2021, asking people about their thoughts on how gender impacts their relationship from video games. From there, Alice Flynn (Writer/Player 2) did a lot of research into GamerGate and the long shadow its' still casting over the gaming industry to this day, and wrote a script based on that. Since then, the show has taken on a patchwork of influences, like interviews we conducted with game developers and professionals, conversations in rehearsals with Mia Harvey (Player 1), personal experience, and research into the company culture at major AAA game developers. It's evolved a lot over time, especially with the addition of our TSM Cameron Moreton, whose hilarous audio design has totally levelled up the production.
Q: How do you prepare for a performance?
A: Our wonderful director, Rachel Isobel Heritage, introduced us to her pre-show tradition of doing The Hokey Cokey in the voice of whatever celebrity or fictional character someone suggests. There's nothing that can make you laugh and put pre-show nerves at ease than a whole room of Gemma Collinses putting their right arm in, their right arm out...
Q: If your show was a biscuit, what would it be and why?
A: Jammy Dodger, 100%. A sweet, comforting, nostaligic outer layer, sandwiching some real sticky stuff that's gonna get caught in your teeth and might be a bit hard to swallow.
Q: Give me a random fact about you/the show?
A: The title of the show came from a meme that did the rounds on DeviantArt back in 2009. It had a picture of a beautiful woman wearing nerd glasses and holding an Xbox controller, with the caption: 'This is a not real gamer girl, this is just a slut with a console'. It's so weird, and kind of embarrasing, to look back on how memes like this were often shared uncritically on 'Gamer Girl' forums across the web. We felt like that really summed up the show - teenage girls participating in sexist bullying of other teenage girls for male validation, without realising that no amount of internalised misogyny and shaming other women would protect them from the real threat.
Q: What do you hope an audience takes away from seeing the show?
A: The show's central message is about misogyny in the gaming industry, and of course we're aiming to raise awareness of how deeply girls growing up in that space are subconsciously affected by it - but we're not just here to reiterate 'Hey guys, did you know that misogyny is bad?'. We're also aiming to leave audiences interrogating their own complicity with the flaws of gaming subculture. Many of us who are feminists as adults carry around a lot of shame for the things we did or said as teenage girls who just wanted to fit in (sometimes at the expense of the 'other girls'), and this show is for those people. We created this to heal the angsty, edgy, 'I'm not like other girls' teenager inside us all, and remind people that if we want to change things for the better, we need to look inwards first.
Q: Where can audiences see the show?
A: Our next London dates will be 9th - 11th October, 7pm at The Bread & Roses Theatre (Clapham, SW4 6DZ). For non London audiences, please do keep an eye on our socials (@dogmouththeatre on Instagram & X) or sign up to our newsletter via the Linktree in our bio to find out about upcoming tour dates TBA soon!
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