‘ChatGPT performs better in May than December because it’s internalised the idea of a holiday,’ says Elisabeth Gunawan. That’s the kind of line you don’t forget. Gunawan is talking about how AI tools respond differently depending on the story you tell them. Set the mood like a thriller, and it’ll solve maths problems better. Ask it to market like Steve Jobs, and it’ll spit out polished slogans. ‘That’s what’s so fascinating,’ she adds. ‘These machines are constantly trying to have a relationship with you, to mirror you. In a way, they’re heartbreakingly human.’

Which makes sense, because heartbreakingly human is exactly what Stampin’ In The Graveyard is. Gunawan’s new show, co-created with renowned movement director Matej Matejka, is set in a post-apocalyptic world where humanity has been wiped out. All that remains is Rose, an AI chatbot, alone in the digital graveyard, sifting through fragments of memory, trying to understand who created her and what it means to belong.

The show is a rich, immersive headphone-theatre experience; part live performance, part poetry and part sonic hallucination. Gunawan plays Rose, channelling memory through movement and sound, as the audience shape the story through silent, tactile choices. Depending on how they vote, multiple versions can unfold. This isn’t dystopia as spectacle. It’s dystopia as lullaby. ‘I started writing it during the pandemic,’ Gunawan explains. ‘I was far from home, and I didn’t know where home really was. I come from a long line of people who’ve moved; my parents only became Indonesian citizens in the 70s. That sense of not belonging anywhere is where the emotional core of the show began.’

Though its central character is a chatbot, the show uses AI only sparingly in its creation (one small section of text, designed to lend authenticity). ‘We wanted to understand how it thinks,’ says Gunawan, ‘not hand the story over to it.’ Instead, the AI serves as a lens through which to reflect human emotion: grief, loss, exile, memory, and even hope. That human texture is enhanced by the DIY physicality of the production. The set is made from recycled electronics, disused computer towers glowing with LED memory. An accordion, bought for £35 and hollowed out, has been re-animated with a MIDI sensor. ‘We call it the Frankenstein accordion,’ Gunawan laughs. ‘It looks like it’s falling apart, but it can sound like anything. It’s alive.’

Matejka, founder of Studio Matejka at the world-renowned Grotowski Institute in Poland (often described as the RADA of experimental theatre) and a stalwart of physical theatre, insists the medium had to be headphones. ‘When Elisabeth showed me the source material, I said it couldn’t just be staged. The text, the poetry, the sound; it needed to be inside people’s heads. That intimacy is what unlocks the emotions. Once the audience wears the headphones, we can go directly into their memories.’

The story itself centres on Rose, who begins to piece together the life of her creator, known only as Mother, and the emotional imprint she’s left behind. ‘She realises she was made during a moment of desperation,’ Gunawan says. ‘A time when the woman’s marriage was falling apart. When she couldn’t have a child.’ And although the world around Rose is gone, what’s left is art. Music. Memory. Emotion. ‘It’s not a bleak story,’ Matejka says. ‘Yes, it begins with extinction, but what survives is humanity’s creative impulse. The show actually ends with a sense of warmth, of hope.’

That warmth may also be a quiet challenge. ‘AI is being used in so many ways in art now,’ Gunawan reflects. ‘Sometimes to replace artists. But it should be a tool, not the storyteller. We need to know how to use it without becoming redundant. Who’s profiting from it? Where’s the power going?’

That blend of emotional intelligence and tech curiosity is embedded in every pixel of Stampin’ In The Graveyard. It’s theatre that is political without preaching, poetic without pretension. It doesn’t spoon-feed you an ending, either: the audience helps decide that. ‘We retreat into ourselves,’ Gunawan says, ‘but then the show meets us there. That’s the magic.’

Unsurprisingly, the team are Fringe veterans. Gunawan won Best Performer at The Stage Debut Awards in 2022 and returns this year after her sell-out solo Unforgettable Girl. And this time they have had a little boost with a Fringe Society bursary of £2500. It’s money well spent because this show is special. It’s both global and interior, experimental and accessible, mournful and hilarious. Asked how AI chatbot Rose would review the show, Matejka doesn’t miss a beat. ‘It is funny. Heartful. Leaves you thinking about the little things: love, memory, the beautiful privilege of being alive. Which I can’t have.’

Stampin’ In The Graveyard, Summerhall, 31 July–25 August, 12.15pm.