EDINBURGH 2026: Mel Hudson: RICHARD ASHCROFT REVIVED MY LIBIDO Q&A

BWW catches up with Mel Hudson to chat about bringing Richard Ashcroft Revived My Libido to the 2026 Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

Tell us a bit about Richard Ashcroft Revived My Libido.

The clue is mainly in the title. I went to a Richard Aschcroft gig at Crystal Palace Bowl just after lockdown in June 2022,  when I was 56, and found myself repeating a level on the multiplayer RPG of life - one that I'd previously completed at around 14, which is developing an adolescent crush on a rock star as a gateway to (re)-entering the world of men who are slightly more available. I'd been single and celibate for a decade, my kids were grown and flown, my cat had died. And suddenly my lust for life was Re-Verved.

That's the pivotal point of the show. But thinking about that led me on to exploring the whole history of my libido, from birth to the present - the part it's played in my life, the lessons I've learned along the way, and the joy of celibrating it all - which I think is not something, as women, we do often enough.

My daughter (25) is in the show too. I'm giving her a leg-up in showbiz. So in return she gives her perspective. Which is that it's cringe, but for the sake of intergenerational harmony we should all learn to overcome that. (Actually only one half of that is her perspective.)


Where might we know you from?

I've played a lot of French women, for some reason, in the past. I went into a book shop in Sydenham a couple of Christmases ago and the guy said 'Nina Vanier - wow. I'm a big fan of your work.' He meant Nina Vanier as in Alan's co-host in one ep of Knowing Me Knowing You With Alan Partridge. Then there was Lauren's French Teacher in a sketch in The Catherine Tate Show - that gets recycled every so often on the socials and gave me a lot of cred points when my kids were little, teenage and also still now. But I've always done a lot of voice/audio work - if you listen to Radio 4 Extra you'll get me on repeat every year from one series or another of The Hudson and Pepperdine Show, which was a variety show-sitcom-sketch-show I did with Vicki Pepperdine in the noughties. And nowadays I get fan mail from listeners to Adrian Tchaikovsky's Children of Time series of novels, which I narrate. Voices include several generations of nanovirally-uplifted spacefaring arachnids, corvids and molluscs, as well as the human and AI versions of Dr Avrana Kern, whose Teresa-May-like tones seem to make the hair raise on the arms of certain types of male listeners.


With this being your debut solo show, do you think you know what to expect from the Fringe?

Yes I think I do. Has it changed at all in 28 years? Probably not. I've got my daughter with me to handle any newfangled aspects anyway.


Who would you like to come and see it?

It's for everyone - I genuinely aim for and believe that. But I suppose narrowing it down: Mid-life women, their daughters, their sons, their partners and ex-partners, and Richard Ashcroft. And his wife. (I'm not a stalker - his loudly proclaimed love for his wife is one of the things I love about him.)



What would you like audiences to take away from it?

I got a review that said 'The thing that stays with you is the joy.' Job done. We play out on 'Surprised by the Joy' - one of RA's solo tracks. It's what inspired me, and I hope to pass it on.

**Mel Hudson is at Ed Fringe with Richard Ashcroft Revived My Libido -  Gilded Balloon Teviot, 5th – 30th August (not 18th) at 16.20. For tickets: https://tickets.gildedballoon.co.uk/event/14:6725/

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