Sophia Cleary
SOPHIA CLEARY is a queer, genreless, childless & anti-disciplinary comedian, writer, and artist working with jokes, video, dance, music, and more.
It Gets Worse is a raw, comedic exploration about the horrors of being in relationships, specifically with oneself. Inspired by her journey as a child actor, mall goth, birth doula, private investigator and waiter, Cleary tells the story of her realization that she is all that and more (gay).
The poster for IT GETS WORSE shows you with the comedy/drama masks painted on your butt cheeks, smiling back at us in a mirror. Is that a symbolic or literal representation of the themes in your show?
The photograph I created is an impossible image— it’s a mirror in which the reflection is my image looking into a mirror. The angles and lighting are all impossible and flattened using editing devices. The phrase that comes up for me with this work is “It might not be real but it’s true.” A lot of my show navigates fantasy and dark thoughts that shouldn’t be acted upon. It’s pure Id. Even though they aren’t real, they’re feelings I have. So there’s a degree of truth to them. So I guess you could say it’s a symbolic representation. It’s the unconscious, it’s the ever-deepening spiral into a portal of self and other.
Your show is described as a "comedic exploration about the horrors of being in relationships, specifically with oneself". What do you end up showing us about the relationship to the self, through your performance?
What I show in this work is that we can have and express our dark fantasies and that those things are normal and should not be repressed. However — there is a time and a place for that, which my show addresses, as well. ;)
This year is your Fringe debut. Are you already planning on going back next year? What kind of project would you develop and produce next?
I am not already planning on coming back next year, however I can see myself coming back in the future. I truly do enjoy the masochistic element of this experience and it feels like worthwhile hardship. I would love to create a show that has less to do with verbal language and more storytelling through games, audience, and the body. I’d love to challenge myself to make a wordless show.
You also directed Nalini Sharma's show UNTIL DEATH. How did you find the time for both? Did switching back and forth from performer in your own show, to the eye of a director in someone else's end up helping you with IT GETS WORSE?
I was supposed to come to Fringe with It Gets Worse in 2020, so this show has been with me for a long time and I wasn’t necessarily creating this or developing it much more this past year. These past couple years I’ve been focusing much more on helping other people develop their work, which I did with Nalini a lot this last year. I got the offer to come here at the last minute, in May, so I was able to resurrect It Gets Worse pretty easily and I’ve been having so much fun giving it new life and meaning during this run!
Can you tell us about some other shows you've seen at Fringe this year that you would recommend checking out?
YES! Nalini Sharma (obviously), Amrita Dhaliwal, Isabel Klein, Sunanda, Andrea Spisto, Gemma Soldati, and all the drag kings performing at the Blundagardens.