IS THERE WORK ON MARS? at Edinburgh Festival Fringe
The show will run at Playground 1 at ZOO Playground from 1 - 24 August
Returning to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe with their smash-hit theatre show, interdisciplinary performance artist, writer, and director Faye Yan will present Is There Work On Mars? - a semi-autobiographical solo performance about an Asian woman with a maths learning disability who tries to pass the ‘Martian Worker’s Immigration Exam’ conducted by Nylon Tusk’s SpaceY.
Nominated for a Neurodiverse Review ADHD Comedy Award and enjoying a five-star run at Edinburgh Festival Fringe 2024, Is There Work On Mars? welcomes us to an absurdist testing lab of dystopian speculations. Attempting to move to Mars via the Worker’s Visa, a woman with ADHD and dyscalculia finds herself in SpaceY’s testing lab. She fights through an ableist and racist mix of bleep tests, personality quizzes, and job interview questions with her wide array of talents – striptease, beer pong, and cheerleading – to not be the Asian failure who is just ‘never enough’.
Faye Yan (b. Yafei Zheng, Beijing) is a London-based interdisciplinary performance artist, writer, director and filmmaker. Her work combines durational art with theatre and engages with diaspora, gender, mental health and social issues. Is There Work On Mars? has toured across multiple locations to Southbank Centre (London), Contact Theatre (Manchester), Theatre Peckham (London) and Camden Fringe (London). Her solo and collaborative live art projects have taken her to platforms such as Riposte (London), Aotuspace (Beijing) and X Museum (Beijing). In film and video, her works have been awarded Best Screenplay by International Youth Short Film Competition and Best Animation by Shorttakes Festival.
Assisting Faye Yan in bringing their eclectic one-woman-show to life this summer is Pannavich Weswibul (Music), Charlie Nelson (Music), and Joanna Mathews (Dramaturg).
Delving into ableist education systems, the experience of living in the diaspora, and ridiculous immigration requirements with a skilled balance of humour and irreverence, Is There Work On Mars? is a thought provoking and deeply honest satire about how it’s ok to be a ‘failure’ in life at the end of the day. The show will run at Playground 1 at ZOO Playground from 1 - 24 August (Previews on 1, 2, and 3), 16:30 - 17:30 daily (60 mins), including access performances.
Videos
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That'll Be The Day Belgrade Theatre (6/09-6/09) |
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Farley Music Festival 2026 - 09 June to 14 June 2026, All Saints' Church, Farley, Salisbury All Saints' Church (6/09-6/14) |
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Jesse Malin + Diane Gentile at Union Chapel - London Union Chapel (6/13-6/13) |
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Paul Merton & Suki Webster''s Improv Show Harrogate Theatre (10/02-10/02) |
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The Go-Between The Food Museum (8/13-8/15) |
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RICH HALL and Matt Richardson at The Norwich Puppet Theatre Norwich Puppet Theatre (5/22-5/22) |
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Always Be Comedy: Balham The Bedford (6/20-6/20) |
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Cyrano de Bergerac Norden Farm Centre (6/13-9/05) |
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The Go-Between Stamford Arts Centre (9/12-9/12) |
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Fawlty Towers Weekend 01/08/2026 Barton Manor Hotel and Spa (8/01-8/02) |
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