Camden Fringe: Harry Petty on Wrap Party

Two best mates, a catering van and one very morally dubious audition

Wrap Party pulls back the hatch on a part of the film industry nobody puts on screen: the catering van. Created by You Guys Productions, the show follows lifelong friends Harry and Ollie through one last chaotic service before the wrap party begins, as A-list egos, health inspections and impossible coffee orders pile up around them. Writer and director Harry Petty built the piece around the real working lives of performers Harry Warren and Ollie Hart, who multi-role their way through the story as it tips from comedy into something more precarious. Ahead of its run at the Lion & Unicorn, Harry Petty told us more.

Red Bus: Wrap Party is rooted in real film-set experience, catering vans, A-list egos, impossible coffee orders. How much of what happens in the show actually happened to you or people you know, and did anything have to be toned down for the stage?

Harry Petty: The play is based on the real-life experiences of our actors, Harry Warren and Ollie Hart, who are also best friends in real life. Our writer and director, Harry Petty, got excited listening to them talk about a summer they spent working together in film-set catering. He immediately said, “This is a Fringe show,” and got writing. A surprising amount of what happens in the play is based on real stories, although we have exaggerated and combined some of them to create the world of the show. We have also had to tone down some of the grosser elements of working in a kitchen because we do not want to put people off their food completely! Some famous faces are also gently satirised. We will leave it to the audience to guess who they might be.

Red Bus: Harry and Ollie are played by two performers taking on multiple roles between them. What was the biggest challenge in finding the right rhythm for that, especially as the story tips between comedy and something more precarious?

Harry Petty: This is something we have worked intently on throughout the development of the show. Our approach has been to ground each performance in a very clear physicality, while also giving every character a full psychological profile. That has helped us avoid making the supporting characters feel like simple caricatures. We wanted to find the humanity in the people we are representing, as well as making them funny. The biggest challenge has been making every character immediately clear while keeping the pace and energy of the play moving, particularly when the story starts to become more precarious. There is one scene where Ollie plays five different people in quick succession. He is working incredibly hard, but that is also when the joy and comedy really come out. The audience can see him spinning all of the plates, and that becomes part of the fun.

Red Bus: The show is billed as being about invisible labour as much as ambition. Was that always the heart of the piece, or did it emerge once you started writing about the catering van specifically?

Harry Petty: That has always been central to the play. Our writer and director, Harry Petty, was conscious from the beginning that he was presenting the lives of two people whose stories we do not usually get to see. Sebastien Conti, the film’s director, barely knows the people who make his film possible, but, without giving too much away, it is Ollie who ends up saving him from a very embarrassing situation. Hearing more and more from Harry and Ollie about the world they had worked in drove the writing and helped the play develop from a character comedy into something that also nods towards something more poignant. Their stories are so far removed from the ones being celebrated on screen, but they are still full of drama, ambition and chaos. We hope we do justice to them and to all the people working behind the scenes whose labour makes the glamour of the film industry possible.

Red Bus: Without giving away the “morally dubious” audition offer that sets the second half in motion, can you tell us a little about the moment you knew that was the hinge the whole play would turn on?

Harry Petty: It came out of a story Harry Warren told us about awkwardly bumping into a famous director in a compromising position. We could not help but laugh, but we also started thinking about how a story like that could drive the drama of the play rather than simply being another funny film-set anecdote. Both Harry and Ollie have dreams dangled in front of them during the show, and these chance encounters with people in positions of power can feel like incredible opportunities. We wanted to explore what those opportunities might cost and how much someone might be willing to overlook or compromise when they are desperate to get into an industry that often feels closed to them. That was when the audition offer became the hinge of the play, because it suddenly placed pressure on both their friendship and their ambitions.

Red Bus: Wrap Party is only 60 minutes, on for two nights at the Lion & Unicorn. What do you most want a first-time Camden Fringe audience to walk away thinking about, and is there anywhere beyond the festival you’re hoping to take the show next?

Harry Petty: We would love people to leave feeling that they want to see more of Harry and Ollie. There is so much material that we have had to cut to make the play as fast and streamlined as possible, and we hope the hour runs a little like the pilot episode of a larger story. There are so many more characters, disasters and corners of the film industry that we would love to explore, and our ultimate ambition would be to develop Wrap Party into a television comedy. Before that, a longer run at a London theatre would be the dream, perhaps somewhere like Soho Theatre. More than anything, we want to build a following of people who get behind the boys’ story, care about their friendship and root for them, even when they make some very questionable decisions.

Wrap Party is at the Lion & Unicorn Theatre on 23 and 24 August 2026 at 7pm, as part of Camden Fringe 2026. Tickets are £14, with concessions at £12.

Wrap Party is one of the Red Bus picks for the Camden Fringe, find out about the others: