It's Sasha Ellen's turn

Written by: Si Hawkins
Published: Thursday 13th July 2023

Is Dungeons and Dragons funny? It is now.

If you saw the refreshingly amusing and accessible Hugh Grant/Chris Pine flick Dungeons and Dragons: Honour Among Thieves earlier this year, you may have come away wondering whether an actual game of DnD would be equally entertaining. Well, it is in the hands of Sasha Ellen.

Arguably the UK's foremost stand-up-cum-dungeon master, this August she'll cross those streams at the Edinburgh Fringe, with two shows, including her gagsmiths-get-geeky game night Character Building Experience, which usually happens monthly at London's Museum of Comedy. Is the comedy circuit secretly a coven of dice-throwing fantasists then, or is Ellen converting them? All will be revealed in our chat below.

Sasha is also doing a more traditional stand-up Fringe show, If Life Gives You Ellens, Make Ellenade, which she'll be previewing further south over the next few months: at the Hastings Comedy Festival on June 15, then the Oxford Comedy Festival on July 29.

Doing two Fringe shows sounds risky. But, hey, why not roll the dice?

So you're a professional dungeon master and gamemaster generally. Is that like being hired to compere a gig, a bit?

In some ways - sure! Sometimes it's a civilised evening of rules-based fun and sometimes it's keeping a bunch of random characters from burning the place down. You meet a lot of cool people, of vastly different ages and from various walks of life, which is always interesting.

I think the idea of a Dungeons and Dragons player evokes a very particular image in most people's minds, which more often than not just isn't the case anymore. Don't get me wrong, there is still a fair number of beardy boys, in niche-referencing teeshirts who love to smash stuff with broadswords. Some of my best friends are beardy boys in niche-referencing teeshirts who love to smash stuff with broadswords.

But mostly it's people looking for a bit of fantasy-based escapism with their friends, family or co-workers. Nothing more bonding than a bit of casual questing on an otherwise uneventful Monday.

Are there many dungeon masters on the comedy circuit - or dungeon, er, apprentices? Lots of secret offstage games going on during the Fringe?

I don't know that it's a secret that a disproportionate number of comedians play DnD and other roleplaying games (RPGs). There is a lot of crossover between roleplaying games and comedy: telling a story, playing a character, a rampant celebration of failure, to name a few. There are a lot of us.

I've found this extremely helpful for Character Building Experience - it's often that I'll ask a random comic I know to come be on the show and they respond with, "Great, I'll resurrect Frumpkin McGee, my trigger-happy, amorous, kleptomaniac gnome bard."

How did Character Building Experience come about, originally?

Character Building came from me playing various RPGs with comedian friends and really wanting to do a chaotic show where people just got to come and play. A show that was just for fun. EdFringe can be a very intense festival and Character Building was born of a need to bring back the joy. I do love having a whole other contrasting show on the go, something completely different, that's a bit weird and occasionally involves comedians making super questionable fantasy life choices.

What's been your favourite edition of CBE so far - and greatest moment?

Oooh, that's a tough one. It's tough because taking any highlight of any story out of context makes it sound psychotic. Like the time when a panellist made a character choice to play the entire game as a sentient forlorn tree and it just worked. Or when another comedian let his whole party die in a flaming airship crash, while he escaped on his falcon because of a terrible pun made earlier in the game.

Or any time we get a musical comedian on and they improvise a song about a ridiculously specific situation that's catchy enough to make the multitude of geeky strangers in the audience sing along. I just love the jubilant mayhem.

What did you make of the recent DnD movie? I believe the previous ones left a bit to be desired?

I really enjoyed it. With all DnD-inspired stuff, there is a very fine balance between including people who are in no way familiar with the game but are curious about the concept and diehard nerds who will rage at every inaccuracy with the fire of a thousand suns. And I think the new DnD movie really struck that balance.

Sure, some stuff was unlikely/impossible but there was enough story and humour to keep everyone engaged and enough small references to keep the nerd in me feeling smug at getting the reference.

Tell us about your other show, When Life Gives You Ellens. Is there any lemon/fizzy pop material, or just a good title?

Ha! This reminds me of a time I did a show called Pickle, and I consistently had furious dudes coming up to me afterwards asking why it was called Pickle, as if disappointed by a lack of a comprehensive history of vinegar-based preserves. Not enough of that on the Fringe, if you ask me.

I'm afraid there is no actual lemonade - best to get that out early. The lemons are purely metaphorical. My runner-up title was Brimful of Sasha, but it left the under-30s baffled.