Interview: Mark McAuley on Diary of a Mad Man

Mark McAuley’s one-man Diary of a Mad Man moves Gogol’s story to contemporary Ireland and gives its lonely protagonist a social media following. After 26 performances at Edinburgh Fringe, it transfers to the Old Red Lion in Islington for six performances from 24 to 28 November. Red Bus Londinium asked Mark about his first acting coach, the livestream at the heart of the show, and what changes for London.

Red Bus: Your first acting coach, Tim McDonnell, won an Obie for playing this role in 1989. What did he teach you that you found yourself using while making this version, and did you ever want to ask him what he would have done with a follower count?

Mark McAuley: I would have loved it if Tim could have seen this show. I think he would have loved our version. A few members of the old studio came to see it and they thought the same.

Tim’s approach was the Stanislavski method, which originated in Russia, and of course Gogol was a Russian writer. I feel the two marry really well together.

So much of what Tim taught me went into this performance. Establishing a relationship with the place and environment, creating truthful behaviour that reveals the psychology of the character, identifying the conflict within the character and also externally with the world around him. 100% commitment to everything I do on stage. Going all in! But most importantly, being truthful on stage. Every movement, every piece of dialogue, every action has to be grounded in truth.

An audience member came up to me after one of the Edinburgh performances. They said that they were originally from Moscow and had a background in theatre. They loved the performance and said it felt “very Russian”, particularly the physicality and the psychology behind the character’s behaviour. That was a huge compliment for me. Russian theatre, the Moscow Art Theatre and Stanislavski are at the heart of so much of modern acting, and Tim was my direct connection to that.

Tim was a real acting mentor to me. He also taught us to connect with the big ideas in a play and understand its historical context. What’s happening today in the world and how the performance ties into that.

His own performance was very faithful to Gogol’s original text. But I think he would have really enjoyed the way we’ve incorporated social media and the follower count. Imagination and play were a huge part of his teaching, and I think our approach ticks both those boxes.

Red Bus: Gogol wrote his story over 190 years ago, yet it fits online life so neatly. Was there a particular moment in the adaptation with Derek Masterson when you realised the diary entries had to become posts and livestreams, rather than the social media being added on top?

Mark McAuley: When I first read the original story, the idea immediately jumped into my head. Originally, I was thinking of tweets or something similar. But then the livestream idea started forming. I thought it would be a very cool way of contrasting the reality of what the character is going through with the reality he wants to portray through social media. It’s also a commentary on how we use social media today. Derek and I worked on bringing that into the story so it wasn’t just something added on top. It had to be part of the character’s journey and how he sees himself and the world around him.

Derek and I also did loads of improvisation sessions over Zoom while developing the play. I’d throw out ideas, improvise scenes, go off on all sorts of tangents. Some really interesting material came out of those sessions. Derek then had the job of making sense of it all and turning it into something that actually worked as a script. He was brilliant at interpreting my ramblings and improvisations. Basically, he had to make sense of the ramblings of a madman!

I’m a film director as well, and I often look at staging theatre through that lens. I love creating really strong visuals on stage, whether that’s through lighting, sound, the actors’ physicality and movement, or even adding technology, as we’ve done with the projection screens. This is a play about the negative effects of technology. So what better way to demonstrate that than by actually using it? The audience can see for themselves what’s happening to him online. It’s also a very visual and entertaining way of engaging with an audience. It looks great and adds a whole new dimension to the show.

However, at the core of the play, it’s a man on stage telling a story. That has to be the most truthful element. Everything else is there to help serve that story.

Red Bus: The show deals with prejudice and online radicalisation, but also asks the audience to stay in the room with a man we are uncomfortable laughing at. How did you decide where the humour ends and the unease begins, and did that line move after 26 performances in Edinburgh?

Mark McAuley: I was thinking about that whole rubbernecking thing. Watching someone going through a very public personal crisis, and yet some of their behaviour and actions can be deemed funny. But should we be laughing at this person, or asking them if they’re okay?

We see so many examples of people struggling publicly, particularly on social media, while everyone else watches, comments and shares. It can be such a toxic environment.

I wanted to draw the audience in with the humour and then gradually let the reality of what’s happening sink in as things begin to escalate towards the end. Humour is a great way of dealing with heavy subjects, and this play is genuinely laugh-out-loud funny at times. But then, as the reality creeps in, we begin to question whether we should actually be laughing at this man’s breakdown.

At the beginning, his prejudices and delusions are relatively small, as is his online audience. But the more erratically he behaves, the bigger his audience gets. The louder he becomes with his anti-immigration rhetoric, the more followers he attracts. He’s actually being rewarded for this behaviour.

When did a person’s mental breakdown become entertainment? And how responsible are we as a society for allowing it to happen?

Over the 26 performances in Edinburgh, I was constantly listening to the audience. Where they laughed, where they went quiet, what made them uncomfortable. You learn so much from that as a performer, and it definitely helped me find those moments as the run went on.

Red Bus: Directing yourself in a one-man show is a particular challenge. What do you do to get an outside eye on your own performance, and what did the lighting, AV and sound design of Iris Liange give you that you could not have given yourself?

Mark McAuley: It’s really hard! I’ve directed myself in a feature film and three short films, so it’s something I’ve plenty of experience with. But it doesn’t get any easier. You really need to be working with people you trust and believe in. People who’ll be honest with you, challenge you and tell you when something isn’t working.

Videoing myself in rehearsals and recording the show in Edinburgh really helped. We also did a special preview in Dublin before we left, and I listened to feedback from a few people whose opinions I really trust. I just want to make the best work possible.

In Edinburgh it was about listening to the audiences. Seeing what connected and what didn’t. And if something didn’t work, asking why not. The show was constantly evolving in Edinburgh. It was really only in the last two weeks that I began to properly find the performance.

And even now, watching the recordings back, I’m discovering more about where the performance can be improved. The great thing is that we now have time to make those changes to the blocking, lighting, script, tech and performance. Making it tighter, more fluid, with more clarity and truthfulness.

I’m playing multiple characters, often having conversations with each other, jumping between different times and scenes. So even when it becomes the ramblings of a madman, with thoughts jumping all over the place, there still has to be clarity. The audience needs to be able to follow it. And everything I do on stage has to remain truthful.

In Edinburgh we also had a strict 55-minute slot, so that added a little pressure. And there was no opportunity for a Q&A afterwards, which was a shame because so many people wanted to talk about the show.

When I first pitched the show to Iris, I had a very strong vision for what I wanted. But then as we started talking, new ideas started popping into my head. Initially I thought it would be just lighting. But then the video/livestream idea took hold and also how unsettling sound can be. Which is something we played with.

Iris was brilliant at interpreting that vision through the video, sound and lighting, and really adding to it. Her work was a real highlight of the Edinburgh production and something people commented on.

And she did an amazing job with very few resources. Normally, you’d have separate people doing lighting, sound and AV, but we didn’t have that kind of budget. So Iris was basically doing the work of several people. I love working with talented collaborators and allowing them to bring their own ideas and elevate the project even more. And that’s exactly what Iris did.

Red Bus: The Edinburgh run was at Assembly Roxy and you are now moving to the Old Red Lion, which is a much more intimate space with a long history of new writing. What will you change for Islington, and what do you hope a London audience takes home with them after the 60 minutes?

Mark McAuley: We’re going to pare things back a little, but we’ll still have the video projection, sound and lighting. We did a preview in Dublin before Edinburgh in a space with a similar setup to the Old Red Lion, so we have that experience to draw on.

I actually think the intimacy of the Old Red Lion is perfect for this play and performance. I can really pull the audience into the character’s world.

The show has also developed quite a bit since Edinburgh. I’ve learned a lot from watching the recordings, listening to audience feedback and reading the reviews. Seeing what landed and what didn’t, and why. So we’re really honing in on the clarity of the storytelling and making everything tighter.

The show has evolved, as I continue to evolve as an actor and director.

We’re also hoping to have an opportunity for a Q&A, which we couldn’t do in Edinburgh. There were so many people who wanted to talk about the show and its themes afterwards. I really enjoy those conversations and providing the space for them.

Ultimately, I hope audiences have a great evening of theatre. That they find it entertaining, funny, heart-breaking and thought-provoking. And maybe they leave asking themselves a few questions. About loneliness, about how we treat people, about the toxicity of social media and the part we all play in it.

But most of all, I’d love them to question how much of what we tell ourselves is actually true. Because that’s really at the heart of the play.

Diary of a Mad Man plays the Old Red Lion Theatre, 418 St John Street, Islington, EC1V 4NJ, 24 to 28 November 2026.

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