Shay Mace
If you didn’t catch the reference from the title, award-winning actor, writer and performer Stephen Smith is returning to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe this year with three shows all adapted from the work of Edgar Allen-Poe. Smith’s work, under Threedumb Theatre, has gained critical acclaim for its scope and detail in portraying Allen-Poe’s famously darkly gothic storytelling in a faithful yet innovative manner. We caught up with Stephen for a pixelated pint to find out about his plans for August, and how on Earth he keeps six Allen-Poe scripts in his head at one time.
You can catch One Man Poe: The Black Cat and The Raven, One Man Poe: The Business Man and The Case of M. Valdemar, and One Man Poe: The Tell-Tale Heart and The Pit and The Pendulum at Greenside @ Riddle’s Court on August 7-29. Tickets for all 3 shows are Available Through the EdFringe Online Box Office.
Shay: Hi Stephen, we last caught up with you after seeing The Black Cat and The Raven at EdFringe last year. Tell us about what you’ve been up to in the meantime.
Stephen: It’s been a wonderfully busy year! Since last year’s Fringe I’ve been expanding One Man Poe from four stories to six, which has meant returning to Edgar Allan Poe’s work with fresh eyes and learning nearly 6,000 additional words. Alongside that, the show has continued touring nationally and internationally, and I’ve also been developing my other solo production, A Montage of Monet. The biggest milestone, though, was One Man Poe receiving The Derek Award for Best Overall Show at the 2025 Edinburgh Fringe. That gave me the confidence to think much bigger about where this project could go.
Shay: You’re bringing two new stories to light this year in The Business Man and The Case of M. Valdemar. Tell us about developing these new works, and why you picked these stories in particular.
Stephen: Variety is the spice of life. I wanted to surprise people. Most audiences know The Tell-Tale Heart or The Raven, but Poe wrote far more than the handful of stories that usually get adapted. It’s very likely that this is the first ever time that someone has staged The Business Man, which is a brilliantly cynical yet comedic satire about greed, corruption and self-justification that – when staged in the context of a political campaign speech – feels astonishingly contemporary. While The Case of M. Valdemar (originally anonymously published by Poe as a hoax in a science magazine) explores one of Poe’s darkest fascinations: the boundary between life and death. They’re very different pieces, but together they reveal sides of Poe that audiences rarely get to experience. Adapting them has been more challenging than the original four stories, requiring careful editing while trying to remain faithful to Poe’s voice and rhythm.
Shay: Many will wonder, how on earth does he keep all of this in his head (your lines, I mean, plus the intense physicality of it all!). Tell us about your process as a creative, and can you give us any insight into what it’s like to walk around the World with the works of Poe in your mind at all times?
Stephen: Many people assume that because I know nearly 19,000 words of Poe by heart, I must wander around quoting him all day. The reality is quite the opposite. Those stories only really come alive for me on stage, in front of an audience. Outside the theatre, I don’t suddenly burst into The Tell-Tale Heart in the supermarket! What has surprised me is everything else I’ve absorbed over the last six years. I never consciously set out to become an Edgar Allan Poe expert, but spending so much time inside his work has inevitably led me down countless rabbit holes. I’ve become fascinated by the man behind the stories: his life, his relationships, his sense of humour, his love of cats and nature, and the sheer range of genres he wrote in. Those are things I never deliberately sat down to memorise, but they’ve become part of me through immersion. I suppose that’s the real gift of living with an author’s work for so long – you don’t just learn the words, you begin to understand the person who wrote them.
Shay: What are you hoping the audience might take away from the experience, if anything?
Stephen: More than anything, I hope audiences leave with a newfound appreciation for Poe himself. He’s often reduced to a Hallowe’en cliché, but his writing is witty, poetic, psychologically complex and astonishingly modern. If someone leaves wanting to read more Poe, or simply realises that 19th-century literature can still feel immediate and thrilling, then I’ve done my job. And if they also lose a little sleep afterwards… that’s an added bonus.
Shay: What journey has the show been on to find itself at EdFringe 2026?
Stephen: It’s been a remarkable journey. One Man Poe began during lockdown as a live-streamed adaptation of The Tell-Tale Heart performed from my living room. When venues reopened, I combined four stories into a solo stage production, which premiered in 2021. Since then it’s toured across the UK and internationally, including performances in Los Angeles, New York, Baltimore, Dubai and Malaysia, alongside two consecutive sell-out Edinburgh Fringe runs. This year feels like the culmination of everything that’s come before: an expanded repertoire, my biggest Fringe yet, and the chance to share six stories across 42 performances in 23 days.
Shay: With EdFringe now just around the corner, what are you most excited for?
Stephen: Sharing the new stories with audiences. The classics are a joy to perform because I know how they breathe now, but The Business Man and The Case of M. Valdemar are stepping into the unknown. That’s exhilarating. I’m also excited to return to Greenside’s beautiful Riddles Court. It’s become the spiritual home of One Man Poe, and I can’t imagine a more atmospheric setting in which to tell these stories.
Shay: Given the themes of Binge Fringe, if your show was a beverage of any kind (alcoholic, non-alcoholic – be as creative as you like!), what would it be and why?
Stephen: A fine, very old bottle of red wine. Rich, dark and initially quite intimidating, but the longer you spend with it the more flavours you discover. And if you consume too much in one sitting you may begin questioning reality.
A reminder, you can catch One Man Poe: The Black Cat and The Raven, One Man Poe: The Business Man and The Case of M. Valdemar, and One Man Poe: The Tell-Tale Heart and The Pit and The Pendulum at Greenside @ Riddle’s Court on August 7-29. Tickets for all 3 shows are Available Through the EdFringe Online Box Office.
Image Credit: Colin Hattersley
