Aidan Greene’s new stand-up show ‘Stuttermilk Pancakes’ will be at Underbelly Bristo Square Dexter at 5.45pm for tickets go to http://www.edfringe.com
Stuttermilk Pancakes explores embracing the parts of yourself others might see as limitations — when did you realise your stammer could become a strength within your comedy rather than something to hide?
When I first started stand-up, I would always acknowledge that I had a stammer at the beginning of my set but then I’d immediately try to move past it. The problem was I had absolutely no strategy for what happened if I stammered during a joke. Which was unfortunate as I could stammer at literally any time.
A few years into comedy I was doing a fundraiser gig for a child with cerebral palsy. For reasons I still don’t understand, I stammered more that night than I ever had in my life. I barely made it through half my set. I stammered so much that by the end of the gig the audience seemed more concerned for me than the child the fundraiser was actually for.
It was horrific at the time but afterwards I realised I had only one choice. I had to start working with my stammer instead of against it. So I started incorporating it into the comedy whenever it happened. If I get stuck on a word that becomes part of the joke. If I stammer at an unfortunate time then that’s a whole new world to explore. It creates this really unpredictable dynamic because even I don’t fully know what’s going to happen on stage.
My stammer went from being something I ignored in my act to becoming one of the most unique things about it.
You challenge the idea that a stutter should not “define” someone; why was it important for this show to reclaim that conversation on your own terms?
People only ever tell you not to let something define you when they believe that thing is bad.
Nobody ever says “Don’t let being incredibly attractive define you”. But people constantly say it about disability or difference because there’s an assumption underneath it that these things are inherently negative.
When I was younger I never actually thought having a stammer was a bad thing. It was just a fact about me. But over time you absorb how the world reacts to it. I saw terrible portrayals in films and TV where the person with a stammer is either nervous, weak or about to become a serial killer.
The problem is that most of these ideas about stammering weren’t created by people who stammer. They were created by people observing from the outside and then everyone collectively agreed to treat those stereotypes as reality.
My stammer has absolutely defined who I am. I genuinely don’t think I would have become a comedian without it. I probably wouldn’t have become a writer either. My stammer forced me to develop a sense of humour. Nothing can give you a better appreciation of comedic timing than not knowing if your word will ever come out.
I think the point of the show is that if something defines you, that definition should belong to you. Other people saw my stammer defining me as a limitation. I see it as one of the best things that ever happened to me.
The show mixes stand-up with multimedia elements — how does incorporating film and technology help communicate experiences that traditional stand-up alone perhaps cannot?
I absolutely love club comedy. Just a comedian, a microphone and an audience you hope haven’t had too many substances before the show. There’s something genuinely magical about it.
But ever since my first solo show, I’ve always been drawn towards multimedia. I think certain experiences are just funnier, and more emotionally interesting, when you can fully visualise them. Film, sound, projections and technology let you create jokes and moments that simply can’t exist in a standard stand-up setup.
Also stammering is such an internal experience. A lot of it happens in your head: the panic, the anticipation, the strange mental gymnastics of trying to avoid certain words in real time. Multimedia gives me a way to externalise that experience and let the audience feel what it’s like rather than just hear me describe it.
And I honestly just enjoy playing around with form. I think audiences are far more open to experimentation than people sometimes give them credit for, especially at the Fringe. If someone has willingly come to watch a show called Stuttermilk Pancakes, they’ve already accepted this won’t be a normal hour of comedy.
You’ve spoken about how seeing negative portrayals of stammering changed your self-perception growing up; do you think comedy now has a responsibility to broaden representation around speech differences and disability?
I don’t think comedy has a responsibility to do anything other than try to be funny.
But what I’ve realised over time is that simply existing on stage already changes things. Representation doesn’t always have to come from making some grand statement. Sometimes it’s just about taking up space publicly in a way people aren’t used to seeing.
Growing up, I almost never saw people with stammers in comedy unless they were the punchline. So even the simple act of watching someone with a stammer confidently control a room for an hour can subtly shift people’s assumptions.
Your work often balances deeply personal storytelling with big laughs — how do you approach turning vulnerable experiences into comedy that feels joyful rather than heavy?
“Tragedy plus time equals comedy” is a cliche but it’s also completely true.
Once enough time passes you become capable of seeing the absurdity in things that once felt devastating. And a lot of human behaviour becomes very funny the second you stop living inside the emotion of it.
I think vulnerability works best in comedy when it gives the audience permission to laugh at things they normally wouldn’t know how to react to. Stammering can make people very tense because they’re terrified of responding incorrectly. Comedy completely changes that dynamic. Suddenly everyone relaxes.
There’s something really satisfying about taking experiences that once made me feel isolated and turning them into a room full of people laughing together.
Having written and starred in Stutterbug alongside Scroobius Pip, has filmmaking influenced the way you structure and visualise your live shows on stage?
Film has always massively influenced my solo shows. My first three hours were all structured around different film genres. “(500) Days of Stammer” was a romcom, “Stutter Island” was horror and “Eternal Sunshine of the Stammering Man” was science fiction.
I have an MA in screenwriting, so I’ve always been obsessed with structure, pacing, and visual storytelling. I think that naturally bleeds into how I build my solo shows.
What changed after making Stutterbug was my understanding of staging and physicality. It had been years since I’d acted (I’ll explain this in the show) and I suddenly became much more aware of what your body communicates on stage, not just your words.