Inside: Chloe Petts Brown Girls Do It Too Welcome to the Fringe, Palestine Betty Grumble Jordan Gray Shedinburgh Ontroerend Goed Thanyia Moore Mairi Campbell K Mak
Black Blues Brothers
Brown Girls Do It Too: Mama Told Me Not To Come
Nerds: the Bill Gates vs. Steve Jobs comedy
Amazing Bubble Man
Skinny
Ali Woods: Basher
James Phelan - The Man Who Was Magic
Laura Benanti: Nobody Cares
Director
George Sully
Editor Arusa Qureshi
Sales Team
David Hammond
Emilie Roberts
Ema Smekalova
Writing Team
Deputy Editor Louis Cammell
Design Team
Phoebe Willison
Dalila D’Amico
Eilidh Akilade, Evan Beswick, Deborah Chu, Jamie Dunn, Veronica Finlay, Hamish Gibson, Alekia Gill, Sean Greenhorn, Si Hawkins, Katie Hawthorne, Jack Howse, Lorna Irvine, Laura Kressly, Oscar Lund, Tamara Mathias, Kat Mokrynski, Francesca Peschier, David Pollock, Jay Richardson, Claire Sawers, Kirstyn Smith, Xuanlin Tham, Gareth K. Vile, Zoë White
Cover Image
Joel Devereux
Radge Media
Editor-in-Chief
Rosamund West
Commercial Director
Sandy Park
Deputy and Digital Editor
Peter Simpson
Fest Street Dates 2025 6, 13, 20 August
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General Manager Laurie Presswood
Digital Editorial Assistant Ellie Robertson
Editorial Intern Billie Estrine
Contact festmag.com hello@festmag.com
Published by Radge Media C.I.C, M9 Codebase, Argyle House, 3 Lady Lawson Street, Edinburgh, Scotland, EH3 9DR. Every effort has been made to check the accuracy of the information in this magazine, but we cannot accept liability for information which is inaccurate. Show times and prices are subject to changes – always check with the venue. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in whole or in part without the explicit permission of the publisher. The views and opinions expressed within this publication do not necessarily represent the views or opinions of the printer or the publisher. Printed by Micropress Printers Ltd, Southwold
10 Riot Grrrls
Polytoxic on their unapologetic cabaret
21 Welcome to the Fringe, Palestine
A vital showcase of arts
Comedy
50 Not Her First Rodeo
Jordan Gray moulds fear into a punchline
Theatre
84 Body Talk
Betty Grumble and Suhui
Hee on performance and activism
EIF
111 Tapestry of Traditions
A spotlight on the Aga Khan
Music Programme
Cabaret and Variety
119 Main Character Energy
Cabaret characters making their debut
Music
123 Sound Systems
Audio-visual projects at the Fringe
Dance & Circus
127 Last Night a Dance Show
Saved My Life
Nick Nikolaou and Tommy
Small talk queer joy
Kids
130 Everyday Magic
Two innovative circus companies shaking up the genre
134 City Guide
Enjoy our performers’ guide to Edinburgh
Image credits (top to bottom, le to right): Jade Ellis; courtesy of the artist; Dylan Woodley; Joseph Mayers; courtesy of EIF; Meagan Harding; Peter Frankland; Robbie Mullins; Tommy Ga-Ken Wan; James Porteous.
Editorial
Arusa Qureshi
What does it mean to be a dangerous woman? It’s a question that has been ruminating in my mind for months thanks to Australian theatre collective Polytoxic and their femme-fuelled cabaret extravaganza Dangerous Goods . I know that as a woman of colour, my joy, for many, is just as dangerous as my rage. In the context of our current social and political climate, for a woman to be fulfilled, inspired and energised is just as, if not more, dangerous than any discernible, palpable anger. And taking a leaf out of our cover stars’ intersectional playbook, it’s something that drives many of us to do the absolute best that we can –because nothing is more satisfying than pissing off people that wish you harm.
With this firmly in mind, Fest’s Preview issue includes many fierce, formidable women – Jordan Gray, Thanyia Moore, Betty Grumble, Cat Cohen – all of whom return to the Fringe with shows that delve into everything from grief and personal growth to climate collapse and death threats, with plenty of humour and heart in tow. We’ve also got Rubina Pabani and Poppy Jay, hosts of the hit podcast Brown Girls Do It Too, former Best Newcomer award-winner
Urooj Ashfaq, and groundbreaking Scottish folk musician Mairi Campbell. Elsewhere in this issue, you’ll find an introduction to Welcome to the Fringe, Palestine, arguably the most urgent showcase of this year’s Edinburgh Festivals, as well as conversations with Francesca Moody on the resurrection of Shedinburgh; the team behind the Edinburgh International Festival’s dementia-friendly concert; and some up-and-coming stars of Scottish comedy and theatre.
There’s so much incredible work to look forward to but it’s also fair to say that it’s impossible to take the joy without the rage. For myself and my fellow freelancers in Edinburgh, the pressure placed on one month of the year underlines the broken nature of this system. It’s one that renders my relationship with the Edinburgh Festivals complicated – I simultaneously love everything about Edinburgh in August and hate the way it makes me feel. But it’s a dichotomy that I think fuels creativity, activism and the desire for radical change and ultimately, for building something better. In the words of Polytoxic’s Lisa Fa’alafi, “We need the joy as much as we need the rage. We need the joy for ourselves to do the work every day.”
Meet the Team
We asked: Pitch your (fake) Fringe show in one sentence
Phoebe Willison
Lead Designer
“Donkey Bong: hit the zoot and chew the cud with everyone’s favourite equine.”
Sandy Park
Commercial
Director
“Dress Me Up, Scotty. How many party items can one man equip on his being? BYOD (bring your own decorations) and find out.”
Peter Simpson
Digital Editor
“Tractor? I Hardly Know ‘Er! One day I dressed exactly like my avatar from Stardew Valley and got Freaky Friday’d into the game; it's about that.”
George Sully Director
“Batboy: meet the boy behind the man behind the mask behind the fictional character by DC comics.”
Designer
“Subcultural Haircuts as Acts of Rebellion in Post-Industrial Spaces: A Live Lecture”
Ema Smekalova
Media Sales Executive
“King Croak AKA a royal’s journey to fully embracing the frog life AKA a heart wrenching tale of self-acceptance.”
Rosamund West Editor-in-Chief
“Death Wolves: A wildly misjudged, terrifying clowning / bubble show aimed at 3-5 year olds, cancelled a er three performances.”
Arusa Qureshi Editor
“Fighteth the Power: a Shakespearean retelling of Public Enemy.”
Ellie Robertson
Digital
Editorial Assistant
“A TED talk where nobody learns anything or reflects or grows and in fact we all walk away a little worse as people.”
Emilie Roberts
Media Sales Executive
“CORVID-19, 19 crows, one girl and a dream.”
Laurie Presswood General Manager & Accounts
Louis Cammell Deputy Editor
"Gen Zorro – A classic reimagined. Was Zorro a nepo baby? Should this little blonde kid be playing the part? All these questions answered and more.”
Billie Estrine
Editorial Intern
"Speaking in Tongues 1983: Backstage – A play where everyone in Talking Heads gets mad at David for taking too long changing into progressively bigger suits.”
“Russell Brand New: An ill-advised drag king act that will inevitably be cancelled by its Big Four venue the weekend before the Fringe opens.”
Dalila D’Amico
TRIPTYCH REDUX
LEWIS MAJOR
ZOO SOUTHSIDE, MAIN HOUSE
21:30, 1 AUGUST - 24 AUGUST
SKINNY
MICHELLE PEARSON UNDERBELLY BRISTO SQ, FRESIAN 18:50, 30 JULY - 10 AUGUST
THESONICRATS,PLEASANCETWO
10:30,30JULY-25AUGUST
TEN THOUSAND HOURS
GRAVITY & OTHER MYTHS
ASSEMBLY HALL 18:00, 30 JULY - 24 AUGUST
THE LISTIES: MAKE SOME NOISE THE LISTIES ASSEMBLY GEORGE SQUARE: STUDIO ONE 11:30, 30 JULY - 25 AUGUST
ORPHEUS & EDINBURGH INTERNATIONAL FESTIVAL & QUEENSLAND’S PRODUCTION IN ASSOCIATION 20:00,13&15AUGUST
FLICK
MAD NUN PRODUCTIONS
SUMMERHALL RED LECTURE THEATRE 16:45, 31 JULY - 25 AUGUST
LADY MACBETH PLAYED WING DEFENCE CRASH THEATRE CO
ASSEMBLY GEORGE SQUARE: STUDIO ONE 16:15, 30 JULY - 25 AUGUST
EURYDICE& OPERA AUSTRALIA PRESENT OPERA ASSOCIATION WITH CIRCA EDINBURGH AUGUST/15:00,16AUGUST
ORPHEUS & EURYDICE
SKINNY
EDINBURGH INTERNATIONAL FESTIVAL & OPERA AUSTRALIA PRESENT OPERA QUEENSLAND’S PRODUCTION IN ASSOCIATION WITH CIRCA
MICHELLE PEARSON
UNDERBELLY BRISTO SQ, FRESIAN 18:50, 30 JULY - 10 AUGUST
EDINBURGH PLAYHOUSE 20:00, 13 & 15 AUGUST / 15:00, 16 AUGUST
TWO 10:30, 30 JULY - 25 AUGUST
Riot Grrrls
Polytoxic’s Dangerous Goods arrives in Edinburgh with plenty of heat. Leah Shelton and Lisa Fa’alafi talk to Eilidh Akilade about the revolutionary and rebellious feminist cabaret
It has to be said: high-vis vests pair nicely with knee-high cowboy boots and intersectional feminism. This August, Australian theatre collective Polytoxic returns to Edinburgh with Dangerous Goods, the self-proclaimed hot-ashell cabaret which puts social justice under the spotlight. From vocalists to flamethrowers, a stellar line-up of femme performers defy all odds and claim the stage. “It does feel like we’re ready to level up,” says Leah Shelton, turning to her collaborator Lisa Fa’alafi. “We’re really fucking ready.”
Dangerous Goods was conceived through a stereotype: the infamous (and much satirised) cat-calls of construction workers, rendering women little more than street-owned objects. “It’s about archetypes and stereotypes now, so alongside construction workers, we have a whole bunch of di erent iconic stereotypes,” says Shelton. A 1950s housewife, a Polynesian princess, a sex doll – Polytoxic seizes imagery which binds us and subverts their use for our revolutionary release. In this, the duo began to consider the very concept of ‘dangerous’ in a gendered context. “Is it dangerous for a woman to speak her mind? Is it dangerous [for a woman] to have agency over [her] own body or to be naked?”
Dance, aerial work, and physical theatre unravel such matters upon an expectation-defying stage. “You’re so caught up with the physicalness of the act. But then, it’s about cli-
mate change, female empowerment – all of the underlying context is just as important to us as the physical performance,” says Fa’alafi. “I still think it comes down to that whole ‘you cannot be what you cannot see,’ or whatever it is.”
“We’re in a time where we need action – physically, mentally, from the heart”
Lisa Fa’alafi
Polytoxic wants femmes to see themselves on stage – spinning, singing, strutting – and realise that they, too, are powerful. Political empowerment across diverse identities has long-rooted itself within Fa’alafi and Shelton’s work, both as Polytoxic and in other artistic endeavours. Fa’alafi’s world-renowned Hot Brown Honey – a Fringe-favourite, co-directed with Kim ‘Busty Beatz’ Bowers – put seven femme BIPOC artists centre stage in a cabaret grounded in decolonial ideology. Dangerous Goods likewise doesn’t stray away from an intersectional lens; in exploring climate justice, racialised experiences, and gender inequality, Polytoxic wants its audiences to understand
Photo: Jade Ellis
that our struggles are interconnected. As Fa’alafi says, “We’re in a time where we need action – physically, mentally, from the heart.”
Most definitely, for Polytoxic, anger has its place; but it, like all of us, needs an ally – both on and o -stage. “We need the joy as much as we need the rage. We need the joy, we need the laughter for ourselves to do the work every day,” says Fa’alafi. Burnout is all too catching; if this work is to be sustainable, Polytoxic knows that it must in turn sustain them. “And that’s our form. We’re not making serious plays, because that’s not how we speak. We speak this way.”
Good comedy spans across the socio-political spectrum – and Polytoxic delights in exploiting this wayward potential. “I feel like, if you can laugh with people, you can break down some of those barriers,” says Fa’alafi. Each slapstick burst or winked innuendo has its own agenda. The more we laugh, the more we connect; and in that connection, small revolutions blossom.
In July, the collective is preparing for a handful of shows at Wynnum Fringe, before undertaking the days-long pilgrimage to Edinburgh Fringe. Amid 10-hour rehearsal days, Shelton and Fa’alafi are putting the final touches to a number of costumes in their capacity as designers – as well as directors – supported by only a few talented costume producers. Dressing seven housewives in matching gingham and balaclavas is no mean feat, they note, referencing the making of one particularly synchronised number. With a laugh, they turn their laptop camera to show a sewing machine and a healthy stack of to-be-adorned fabric. Dangerous Goods is a hands-on production – and such is its brilliance.
“It starts from this,” says Shelton, drawing a line from herself to Fa’alafi, “what happens here between us.” They finish each other’s sentences, laughing at the other’s punchline
before it has so much as escaped their lips. As collaborators of over 20 years, their artistic sensibilities are ever intertwined. “It’s a longterm relationship.”
Earlier in their careers, the duo were less certain as to how best to bring others into their grand visions. “But now we know from doing this so long, and from the feedback from our collaborators, that actually it’s a gi both ways,” says Fa’alafi. “We’re used to working in multiple minds, collaborating that way.”
And for Polytoxic, cabaret curation isn’t a matter of simply throwing together whatever acts they can get their hands onto and hoping for the best; rather, they cra a narrative, an atmosphere and a message with intentionality. “I think that’s also why you love cabaret, because you’re going on this real journey, and you can feel, you can channel all of these emotions,” says Shelton.
As performers, they also rely on this emotional pull. “We’re energy workers,” Fa’alafi says. The audience gives them an inch, Polytoxic takes a mile. Previously performing Dangerous Goods in a theatre, the duo is particularly looking forward to bringing the cabaret to Palais du Variété at Assembly George Square Gardens. In their experience, performing in a tent – a temporary, makeshi space – allows an audience to let loose that little bit more. And that hair-tossing, screech-letting thrill is exactly the kind of danger Polytoxic are hoping to inspire.
“We want all of our audience to be in on that, and to collectively take up the mission, or to join the protest party at the end,” says Shelton. “Make the revolution irresistible – that’s all we want to do.”
SHOW Dangerous Goods
VENUE: Assembly George Square Gardens
TIME: 30 Jul-24 Aug, (not 6, 11, 18), 8.05pm
Photo: Ozlem Tigli
Let's Talk About Sex
Comedian Chloe Petts, podcast duo Poppy Jay and Rubina Pabani, and playwright Jules Coyle on inclusive discussions about sex on stage
Words: Veronica Finlay
People have things to say about sex at the Fringe this year, and there’s a noticeable shi from male narratives to those of women and non-binary performers. Chloe Petts, who is delving into the subject in Big Naturals, wasn’t aware of others doing the same, but it makes sense to her. “I think there must be like a weird zeitgeist that we imperceptibly tap into,” she says, “and we’re thinking about the same things at the same time.”
Big Naturals is about “sex and relationships and honesty”. While sex is the “bouncing point”, Petts is ready to be more honest with everyone in her life, including her audience. “It’s something I haven’t really spoken about on stage before and I find it really challenging,” she says. “Maybe this year I might have got closer to possessing the skills to be able to do that in a way that isn’t embarrassing to me or my audience. And I just hope it makes me a bit more vulnerable on stage as a performer.”
The show’s title refers to a time when images of women’s bodies were less accessible. Petts says, “it’s funny to look back on the 90s and 00s, when ‘big naturals’ was a popular phrase, as a more innocent, quaint time. And I kind of crave the days where the only message we had to worry about was stu like Page Three. Now it feels like the misogyny exists in more dark, visual ways in the far-flung corners of the Internet.”
Poppy Jay and Rubina Pabani, the duo behind the podcast, and now live show, Brown Girls Do It Too, have similar concerns about the Internet and mass media. “I think mainstream media needs to get its shit together,” Rubina says. “The options you have are pornography, which is a fantasy, designed for male pleasure, and even when it’s drama, like Normal People, not all of us can look like Paul Mescal and Daisy Edgar-Jones. It needs to get a bit more real and just normal.”
It’s their first time at the Fringe and they promise that the live show is even funnier than the podcast. “Edinburgh is gonna be wild,” Jay says. “And in terms of comedy, it’s the pinnacle of us being writers and performers.” Pabani agrees: “It’s been so freeing because talking about sex is one thing, but through the prism of comedy, it just gave us so much more space to be really silly.”
Photo: Mark
Senior
Brown Girls Do It Too
Photo: Mark Senior
"Once you see where the power lies and know that you can dismantle it, that’s incredibly freeing"
Rubina Pabani
Sex is a taboo subject in the British Asian community, but they believe conversations are slowly changing. “I think what #MeToo showed us was the power structures in sex,” Pabani says. “It became very apparent who’s controlling the mainstream media, and how we view it and how we consume it, how we feel about our bodies. Once you then see where the power lies and know that you can dismantle it, that’s incredibly freeing.”
Jules Coyle is the writer of Managed Approach, a play about the UK’s first legalised red-light district in her hometown, Leeds. She has seen a shi with the rise of OnlyFans as a space for sex work. “I’d like to think that views are changing in terms of stigma,” she says. “I’m 21, so a er ten years of learning about #MeToo from the Internet, and coming from Leeds, it was then interesting to be able to set my opinions of what was happening in the area on the backdrop of these discussions.”
Her play is “not about sex work as much as it is about the women that live in the area,” which includes sex workers. Their verbatims are interspersed amidst a fictional story about a mother and daughter. Through their relationship, Coyle presents di erent views on the Managed Approach initiative, while not favouring one over the other. “I think [the play] tries to root a bigger issue in the minutiae of fish and chip Fridays between a mum and daughter, and the sort of conversations that can come out of that,” she says.
Coyle has used some of her own mother’s experiences in the play as she “wanted to take some of the experiences she had when she was younger, living in [the era of] the Yorkshire Ripper, and how that has impacted her views on women’s safety now.” She hopes that more representation in film or on stage will lead to fewer taboos and more support for those who are vulnerable. “So it’s just about putting these stories on, in a way that I think the Fringe is really helping people do”, she says.
Equally inclusive, Jay and Pabani don’t want the title of Brown Girls Do It Too to put nonAsian audiences o . “I think so many people would walk past the poster and think it’s just for South Asian women, it’s not for me, but we talk about what it means to be a woman,” Jay says. “And if you’re coming and you’re not South Asian,” Pabani adds, “I hope you leave thinking that we’re just like you.”
Petts wants her audiences to have a good time, but if they feel a rmed or like they’ve
learned something, that’s a bonus. “I have to see it as enough just being on stage and being honest about my experiences,” she says. “Because voices like mine haven’t been heard throughout history. And packaging it in a funny way is also enough because that’s how you talk to people. People don’t want to be lectured by a comedian.”
SHOW Brown Girls Do It Too: Mama Told Me Not to Come
VENUE: Underbelly, Bristo Square
TIME: 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 11) , 4pm
SHOW Chloe Petts: Big Naturals
VENUE: Pleasance Courtyard
TIME: 30 Jul-24 Aug, (not 13), 7pm
SHOW Managed Approach
VENUE: Gilded Balloon Patter House
TIME: 8-24 Aug (not 15) , 1.40pm
Photo: Matt Stronge
Chloe Petts
SYDNEY MORNING HERALD
A Warm Welcome
With Welcome to the Fringe, Palestine arriving at Portobello Town Hall this August, festival co-organiser Sara Shaarawi tells us more about the vital showcase
Words: Katie Hawthorne
Welcome to the Fringe, Palestine is a crowdfunded feat of community in action and this August’s most vital programming. Over four days at Portobello Town Hall, this festival-within-the-Fringe showcases music, theatre, poetry and dance from Palestinian artists – some living in Scotland, with others travelling from the West Bank, ’48 Territories and (hopefully) Gaza, as well as America, Jordan and Beirut. Sara Shaarawi, one of many volunteer festival co-organisers, explains that it’s never been more important to platform Palestinian voices.
“When the institutions that might usually programme Palestinian work are too scared, and there’s so much censorship and harassment, it is urgent to have a strong Palestinian presence at the biggest theatre festival in the world,” she says. “Rather than a commodity you pay for and never think about again, we value Palestinian work as an act of resistance and an act of life.”
This year’s Welcome to the Fringe… grows out of a 2015 iteration, organised as a response to Israel’s bombing of civilians during the 2014 Gaza war. Ten years later, Shaarawi says she feels an even greater responsibility. “The festival is a response to the [continued] dehumanisation that occurs in the media. It’s a way to show, beyond the headlines, how varied and beautiful Palestinian culture is.”
Curated from an open call which received over 100 applications – a huge leap from 2015,
which had 35 – this year’s diverse programme includes contemporary dance drawing on hip-hop and dabke, a work-in-progress new musical by Amira Al Shanti about the rituals of olive harvests, and Randa Jarrar’s play The Last Palestinian Alive, which imagines a young woman waking up alone in 2055 with only an
“We value Palestinian work as an act of resistance and an act of life”
Sara Shaarawi
Sara Shaarawi
Photo: Beth
Chalmers
AI version of Francesca Albanese for company. Panel discussions led by members of We Are Not Numbers sit alongside oud and buzuq music from Gazelleband, and the pointedly titled cardboard-puppetry play Performance Desperately In Need of an Audience
“Come and spend a day with us!” Shaarawi urges. The festival o ers day tickets (as well as individual ones), so that audiences can mix with artists, activists and allies in between shows, and seize the chance to take conversations down onto Portobello beach for a moment of calm reflection amidst the Fringe’s usual chaos.
Mohammed Moussa, a founder of the Gaza Poets Society, will be reading new work alongside fellow poet Dareen Tatour. Over email, Moussa stresses the pressing need for “the amplification of the voices of Gaza’s youth on a global stage” – something the Society pursues through its published anthologies – but also how his belief in the power of words has been sorely challenged in the face of ongoing genocide.
“How do you frame a genocide in Gaza as poetry?” he asks, rhetorically. “How do you weave carnage into verses? Nothing about this devastation is poetic.”
“Poetry doesn’t need to solve the horror; it needs to match its depth,” he writes. “Perhaps in this act of speaking, there’s a path to healing – not to so en the pain, but to let it breathe, to let it be witnessed. To carry the weight of su ering into the hearts of those who dare to hear.”
Institutional powers might be unwilling to listen, but Welcome to the Fringe, Palestine is filling the silence. With neighbours o ering spare rooms and donating time, money and resources, it’s a collective battle against hostile conditions: the war in Iran has made travel plans uncertain, the UK Home O ce is still to grant several visas, and the festival will be crowdfunding until the last minute to cover these unexpected costs. Yet Shaarawi remains brightly determined that the festival will live up to its welcoming title: “It might not be a free process to get here, but it will be a free space.”
SHOW Welcome to the Fringe, Palestine
VENUE: Portobello Town Hall
TIME: 12-15 Aug, 12-9pm
Gazelleband
Come Again?
It’s one of comedy’s biggest breaks, but what happens when you‘re nominated for – and win – Edinburgh’s Best Newcomer award? Back with hotly-anticipated follow-up shows, Urooj Ashfaq (2023) and Joe Kent-Walters (2024) break it down
Words: Si Hawkins
Urooj, you’re currently in Mumbai, Joe in Manchester – but where were you when your Newcomer nominations were announced?
Joe: I was at the pub with some friends, missed the call, so took it outside and got the news. Perfect really. Does that sound bad, that I was in the pub at midday?
Urooj: I was in a cab, and was pretty surprised, so I called my friends. I think the cab driver heard. He just said [gru geezer accent] ‘Good on ya!’
Does everything then get hectic, that week before the result?
Urooj: So true, everyone’s trying to get a ticket. It’s stressful. They messaged all the newcomer nominees: ‘don’t be alarmed if the audiences seem a little judgmental in the last week.’
Joe: I don’t think I was quite prepared for it. I’d asked not to know when anyone was in, just for my head. Then someone told me that the judges all come back to watch the show that week, which made it doubly intense.
Urooj: I felt the most amount of stress I’ve ever felt in comedy, in that last week. And I do comedy in India, where we have people break down our venues if they don’t like a joke.
You were relatively unknown here beforehand, Urooj, was winning impactful?
Urooj: So much – I was able to tour the UK because I won. I have an audience here in India, but the UK was a whole new country, new people, new marketplace. I think my parents really took it seriously when I was a question on the Indian version of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?
Urooj Ashfaq
Photo: Ashiq MK
You’d already won the BBC New Comedy Award, Joe, would it have been disappointing not to be nominated?
Joe: There was a lot of pressure. Dan Tiernan got nominated the year before o the back of it, so there was that expectation, which kind of sucks really. But touring, the word of mouth when you’ve had a really good Edinburgh, that’s been amazing.
Presumably winning also adds expectation to returning this year?
Urooj: I came back for 15 days last year, a WIP then my 2003 show again, which was nice as I wasn’t being reviewed. I feel like this year I will be a bit stressed again.
Were you always doing a new show this year, Joe?
Joe: It was always part of my thinking. I’m working on some TV ideas but they take ages, and the motivation was touring; if I go to Edinburgh and do another show, I know I’ve got something to do next year.
You le us hanging too. Your character, Frankie Monroe, was dragged to hell last time…
Joe: I hadn’t thought of it as a cli anger! The story is continuing in the new one, which has been a funny thing to preview; doing a direct sequel to a live show is quite bold. But I’ve found a nice, weird way to recap the first one.
How does your new show di er, Urooj?
Urooj: It’s me being edgy. The primary accusation from reviews in 2023 was that I am a conservative, non-edgy person; really, conservative is just not a word that one would associate with me in contemporary India. And so this show is me proving that wrong. And it’s also me trying on a persona of a smutty, edgy Bad Girl. Which I’m really enjoying.
How will you both look back at winning Best Newcomer?
Urooj: I’m afraid it’s the peak of my life. It was kind of cute until August 2024, when there was a new Best Newcomer - which is Joe. Now it’s like, ‘I can’t be Best Newcomer 2023 forever,’ I have to do something else with my life.
Joe: On the record, I’ll say sorry! I do feel like it’s given character comedy a nice boost. Perhaps I’ll be a question one day. On The Chase, maybe. That’d be good.
Moody discusses this year’s Shedinburgh programme and the ethos behind the project
Words: Claire Sawers
Around five months into the pandemic, while some worked on their sourdough, Duolingo and Netflix binges, one passionate team was determined to bring live theatre back. With a pun from Glaswegian writer Gary McNair, Shedinburgh Fringe Festival was born; an online festival of theatre, music and comedy.
“It was incredible to have something that gave me great sense of purpose in a time which was pretty devastating for the arts,” recalls Francesca Moody, who co-founded Shedinburgh with McNair and producer Harriet Bolwell. Moody’s own company Francesca Moody Productions has put on theatre shows which became two of the most globally successful TV shows of the last decade: Fleabag and Baby Reindeer.
”I remember the absolute adrenaline rush every time an artist who we never thought would say yes welcomed the opportunity to perform in the shed – Jayde Adams, Chris Thorpe, Tim Crouch, Sophie Duker – all coming back this year too.” In August 2020, 25 shows were livestreamed to an audience of over 5000, from two sheds – one in London’s Soho Theatre, the other in Edinburgh’s Traverse.
“I remember how special it felt to be able to sit in the very small, socially distanced audience, mostly just Harriet and I laughing, crying, whooping or cheering.” In 2021, Shedinburgh returned with a hybrid programme of live and in-person events. This year, Shedinburgh will set up home in a purpose-built venue at Edinburgh College of Art, presenting its inaugural programme of 28 one-o , one-night-only shows. By day, they will run a café/bar (look out for pizza, co ee and beers from Wanderers Kneaded, Williams & Johnson and Newbarns Brewery), and by night, the stage will see performances from Fringe favourites, household names and rising
Francesa Moody
Photo: Rich Lakos
“I’m incredibly passionate about the Edinburgh Fringe and fringe theatre in general – it’s a place for risk taking”
stars. And they are putting their money where their mouths are to make it accessible.
“I’ve had so many conversations in the past few years about how the Fringe is becoming increasingly expensive and inaccessible for artists,” says Moody. “I wanted us to do something about that. I’m incredibly passionate about the Edinburgh Fringe and fringe theatre in general – it’s a place for risk taking. The best and most exciting work can start there. It felt important to create a new model which ensures that is still able to happen. Ultimately, I wanted to make sure that artists weren’t out of pocket, so covering travel and accommodation and paying a guaranteed fee for performance allows us to do that. Because it’s pay-what-you-can, as an audience you won’t really be out of pocket too.”
Moody’s programme highlights include their ‘Shed Originals’. “These are handpicked new pieces of work from emerging artists who we are incredibly excited about. I’d like to think people will say in the future they were the first to see those shows - The Briar Patch by Ciara Elizabeth Smyth; Jack in a Box by Joanna Thomson; Rebellion: A er the B’nei Mitzvahs by Nick Cassenbaum; Mercurial by Rosaleen Cox and A to B by Tia Renee Mullings. I also can’t wait to see Jayde Adam’s new work How to Lose and Not Cry.”
At the time of going to press, applications had just closed on Shedinburgh’s Shedload-of-Future Fund, awarding three £5,000 grants to artists making their Fringe debut in 2025. “I can’t share details yet, but I can say that we had over 100 applications and the breadth and diversity of the work was incredibly exciting to see.
“Shedinburgh started as my love letter to the Fringe. I’m excited to make the case for
more philanthropy for work of this scale and I’m grateful that we have some incredibly generous and passionate people to help make Shedinburgh 2025 a reality.”
SHOW Shedinburgh
VENUE: Wee Red Bar, Edinburgh College of Art TIME: 2-24 Aug
Full programme at shedinburgh.com
Image: courtesy of
Shedinburgh
Shedinburgh
Top Picks: Comedy
From imposter syndrome to medieval saints, these comedy shows will have you in stitches
Jordan Gray: Is That a C*ck in Your Pocket, or Are You Just Here to Kill Me?
Assembly George Square Gardens, 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 6, 12, 19), 9.05pm
It’s been three years since Essex comedian Jordan Gray’s Edinburgh Award-nominated Is It a Bird?, which went on to ru e a few transphobes’ feathers when it aired on Channel 4 earlier this year. Now she’s back, restyled as a heat-packing jokeslinger with a (musical) score to settle.
Rosa Garland: Primal Bog
Assembly Roxy, 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 12), 9.50pm
Trash Salad creator Rosa Garland invites us on a journey into the mind’s slimiest nooks and crannies. Celebrating our innermost desires, Garland’s experimental comedy is an ode to pleasure in all its muck-filled glory.
Shamik Chakrabarti: Despite Appearances
Gilded Balloon at Appleton Tower, 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 11), 9pm
Dry wit and laid back rants characterise Mumbai comedian Shamik Chakrabati’s Fringe debut, which takes aim at every face-value judgement ever made about him. Neither sensible nor good at chess, he’s disproving one Indian stereotype a er another.
Kim Blythe: Cowboy
Gilded Balloon Patter House, 30 Jul-25 Aug (not 11), 7.30pm
TikTok favourite Kim Blythe’s second show charts her imposter syndrome induced by the likes of selling out the Glasgow International Comedy Festival o the back of some front-camera rambling. Comedy’s self-proclaimed cowboy builder faces her feelings of winging it, weegie-style.
Janine Harouni: This Is What You Waited For Monkey Barrel Comedy, 11-24 Aug, 1.25pm
Might third time be the charm for two-time Edinburgh Comedy Award nominee Janine Harouni? Fresh from a world tour, the UK-based, New York-born standup takes on topics like family, parenting and marriage.
Photo: Dylan Woodley
Photo: Corinne Cunning
Photo: Matt Stronge
Photo: Daryll Buchanan
Photo: Rupak Jena
Rosa Garland
Jordan Gray
Janine Harouni
Kim Blythe
Shamik Chakrabarti
Holly Spillar: Tall Child
Underbelly, Bristo Square, 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 12, 19), 5.45pm
Described as the lovechild of Kate Bush and Bo Burnham, Holly Spillar expresses the instability that comes from leaving home while losing one job and quitting another. As life gets more di cult and more expensive, at least venting your frustrations costs little more than a mic, some acerbic lyrics and a loop pedal.
Lou Wall: Breaking the Fi h Wall
Monkey Barrel Comedy, 28 Jul-24 Aug (not 12), 10pm
Australian comic Lou Wall’s musical, memeheavy powerpoint is like having access to your most chaotic Gen Z friend’s phone. Wall re-teams with director Zoë Coombs Marr for a show that includes the sequel to ‘Where is Bed?,’ an unlikely earworm born out of a Facebook Marketplace argument from their previous show The Bisexual’s Lament
Barry Ferns: My Seven Years as Lionel Richie
Just the Tonic at The Caves, 31 Jul-24 Aug (not 5, 12, 13, 19), 6.40pm
For his 20th Fringe show, Angel Comedy founder Barry Ferns looks back on his early years at the festival which included: Legally changing his name to Lionel Richie by deed poll; legendary mixed-bill gigs on Arthur’s Seat; going bankrupt; and being o ered half a million pounds as a TV presenter.
Mr Chonkers
Summerhall, 31 Jul-24 Aug (not 11, 18), 10.15pm
Silliness abounds in John Norris’s long-running ‘waste of time’ of a show. Fans of the absurd may be well acquainted already, such is the show’s cult, word-of-mouth status. If you’ve ever wondered how someone can call something utterly stupid and a must-see at the same time, look no further.
Ayoade Bamgboye: Swings and Roundabouts
Pleasance Courtyard, 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 6, 12, 19), 4.45pm
London and Lagos converged to make Ayoade Bamgboye, whose long-awaited stand-up debut dwells on exactly what that means. How does a quintessentially British need to please contend with the Nigerian standup’s loud personality? Big questions, but with a playful spin.
2024’s Edinburgh Comedy Award Best Newcomer is literally dying to get back on stage. Joe Kent-Walters re-animates his Yorkshire working men’s club owner Frankie Monroe for a throwback that’s more Beetlejuice than Beatlemania.
Photo: Jennifer Forward-Hayte
Photo: John Norris
Photo: Becca Willow
Photo: Monica Pronk
Photo: Jack Hauxwell
Photo: Matt Stronge
Barry Ferns
Mr Chonkers
Holly Spillar
Joe Kent-Walters
Ayoade Bamgboye
Lou Wall
Top Picks: Theatre
The best theatre at the Fringe, from eco-sexual rebellion to the history of panto
Betty Grumble’s Enemies of Grooviness Eat Sh!t
Assembly Roxy, 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 6, 12, 19), 9.15pm
Australia’s eco-sexual rebel Betty Grumble brings her genre-defying show to Edinburgh, drawing on personal experience of intimate partner violence and the court case that followed. Blending performance art, raw physicality, and rock’n’roll, this radical spectacle confronts climate collapse and patriarchy, celebrating the body’s transformative potential.
Ohio
Assembly Roxy, 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 4, 11, 18), 3pm
When Shaun le the church, music became his sanctuary. Now facing degenerative hearing loss, he chooses joy amid life’s uncertainties. From Francesca Moody Productions, this upli ing new musical by Obie winners The Bengsons is a true story of hope, loss, and resilience, told with heart, humour, and song.
Thanks for Being Here
ZOO Southside, 12-14 Aug (not 11, 18), 1.45pm
Eight-time Fringe First winners Ontroerend
Goed invite you into an immersive world where audience and performer blur. Thanks for Being Here uses playful video and interaction to explore perspective and presence. There’s no pressure to participate – you’re free to simply observe. A quietly powerful celebration of theatre’s shared space.
She’s Behind You
Traverse, 1-24 Aug (not 4, 11, 18), times vary
A er decades in the pantosphere, Johnny McKnight li s the curtain on his extraordinary journey through panto. She’s Behind You is a bold and funny celebration of identity, tradition, and transformation, created with acclaimed director John Ti any. A dazzling tribute to the madness, magic, and meaning behind the make-up.
Karine Polwart: Windblown
The Queen’s Hall, 9-13 Aug, 7.30pm
In Edinburgh’s Royal Botanic Garden, a towering Sabal palm nears its end – too old to move, too fragile to stay. As it faces removal, award-winning writer-musician Karine Polwart gives voice to the tree, weaving music and story into a poetic reflection on care, loss, legacy, and the future. With pianist Dave Milligan.
Photo: Kurt Van der Elst
Photo: TLiz Ham
Photo: Aly Wight
Photo: Colin Hattersley
Photo: Oliver Rosser Ohio
Betty Grumble She’s Behind You
Karine Polwart: Windblown
Thanks for Being Here
Alright Sunshine
Pleasance Dome, 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 4, 11, 18), 4.20pm
When PC Nicky McCreadie breaks up a brawl on the Meadows, she’s forced to confront a buried past that she was hoping to forget. From Edinburgh playwright Isla Cowan, supported by Tron Theatre and produced by Wonder Fools, Alright Sunshine is a fierce, feminist monologue about gender, power, and public space.
Kanpur: 1857
Pleasance Courtyard, 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 12, 13), 3.40pm
A darkly comic new play written by and starring Niall Moorjani, o ering a satirical interrogation of colonial history. Set during the Indian Rebellion, it questions heroism and villainy while exploring gender, colonial violence, and the act of making art in times of crisis.
KINDER
Underbelly, Cowgate, 31 Jul-24 Aug (not 6, 13, 20), 6.40pm
When drag artist Goody Prostate arrives to headline a library reading hour, an unexpected call throws everything o script. Scrambling to perform for a rowdy crowd, Goody dives into a wild, heartfelt journey through childhood, memory, and growing up. Fresh from an award-winning run at the Adelaide Fringe.
Fuselage
Pleasance Courtyard, 30 Jul-25 Aug (not 13, 19), 3.45pm
On 21 December 1988, Pan Am 103 exploded over Lockerbie. Annie Lareau was meant to be on board with 35 of her Syracuse University classmates but she stayed behind. Blending the voices of friends and locals, this powerful ensemble piece explores grief, fate, and resilience in the shadow of tragedy.
Elysium
Gilded Balloon at Appleton Tower, 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 11), 12.20pm
Welcome to Elysium Court, a picture-perfect suburb where lives quietly unravel. From Ghouls Aloud comes a satirical ghost story with original live music by Milly Blue and Jessie Maryon Davies. When a new mum li s the astroturf, dark secrets emerge, resulting in a witty, haunting tale of motherhood, ambition, and modern horror.
PHILOSOPHY OF THE WORLD
Summerhall, 31 Jul-25 Aug (not 11, 18), 10.45pm
Experimental theatre company IN BED WITH MY BROTHER are back at the Fringe a er six years, with PHILOSOPHY OF THE WORLD, a chaotic tribute to cult band The Shaggs – three sisters who were forced to form a band by their father. Part tribute act, part feminist reclamation, part fever dream, you’re invited to experience noise, nonsense, and free soda.
Photo: Fotómetro
PHILOSOPHY OF THE WORLD
Photo: Ruari Barber-Fleming
Alright Sunshine
Elysium
Photo: Giao Nguyen
KINDER
Photo: Giao Nguyen
Fuselage
Photo: Alex Winner
Kanpur: 1857
Photo: Samer Moukarzel
Top Picks: Music
This year’s music selection includes punk theatre, pop comedy musicals and a new gig series
Pussy Riot: Riot Days
Summerhall, 12-23 Aug (not 18), 9.30pm
The Russian protest art collective has become one of the most influential voices in global activism. Riot Days is a touring stage production based on Maria Alyokhina’s memoir of the same name, blending punk, electronica, theatre, protest, and documentary footage.
Hot Mess
Pleasance Courtyard, 30 Jul-25 Aug (not 6, 11, 18), 3.10pm
The first Edinburgh Festival Fringe production from the UK’s only in-house New Musical Theatre Department at Birmingham Hippodrome reimagines the climate crisis as a story of love, hope and the ultimate break-up. Created by the award-winning creative duo behind 42 Balloons
How to Win Against History
Underbelly, George Square, 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 4, 11, 18), 7.15pm
The cautionary tale of Henry Cyril Paget, one of the world’s wealthiest men, who lost his fortune by being too damn fabulous. This fierce and heartbreakingly glamorous comedy musical tells the true story of a man who defied expectations and redefined masculinity, only to face spectacular downfall.
In a time when living authentically feels almost criminal again, join the original rebels of F*ck You Counterculture for a night of radical joy. This wild new musical plunges into the kaleidoscopic world of San Francisco’s The Cockettes – a gender-bending troupe of hippies, drag queens, and freaks led by the fearless Hibiscus and disco legend Sylvester.
Little Squirt
Gilded Balloon at Appleton Tower, 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 6, 18), 7.30pm
Darby James’ one-man musical comedy about sperm donation returns to Edinburgh. A er clicking on a Facebook ad for an IVF clinic, he’s plunged into a whirlwind of existential chaos, grappling with the absurdities of reproduction and the complexities of queer parenthood. Little Squirt is a wild ride through the ethics and emotions of creating life.
Big Nights @ La Belle
La Belle Angele, various dates throughout August, various times
Big Nights @ La Belle starts o strong on Fri 1 August with The 900, the UK’s first and only Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater cover band. Later in the month, Jurassic 5’s Chali 2na takes to the La Belle stage (Mon 11), Peter Doherty plays two consecutive nights (Tue 12 and Wed 13), and Eurovision favourite Baby Lasagna makes a pitstop following his European tour (Mon 25).
Photo: Lucinda Goodwin
Image: courtesy of432
Image: courtesy of the artist
Photo: The Other Richard
Photo: Mark Senior Image: courtesy of the company Little Squirt
Chali 2na
Midnight at the Palace
Pussy Riot
How to Win Against History
Hot Mess
Top Picks: Cabaret
Discover the must-see cabaret shows, from twisted pop to gin-soaked humour
Bernie Dieter’s Club Kabarett
Underbelly’s Circus Hub on the Meadows, 1-23 Aug (not 11, 18), 7.20pm
Firebrand Bernie Dieter holds a middle finger up to the mainstream with their gender-bending brand of circus and aerial. For those who like their cabaret shows fiery, gin-soaked and full of campy provocative humour.
Frisky’s Reshu e
Assembly George Square Gardens, 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 6, 11, 18), 9.55pm
One half of musical duo Frisky and Mannish, Frisky goes it alone (if you don’t count the full band) with her debut solo show. But the self-styled matriarch of twisted pop cabaret is dead set on doubling the fun, promising no two shows the same.
Vetted
C aurora, 13-17 Aug, 9pm
RuPaul’s Drag Race’s Veronica Green is Dr Fantasy, certified vet at the InFurMary Vets. Join her as she reminisces about her days at the operating table, full of original songs, puppets and drag queens from The Madame’s Family.
Laurie Black: Deadly Synths
The Famous Spiegeltent, 12, 19 Aug, 9.30pm
This live gig/lecture hybrid takes us through synth history, starting with ‘What actually is a synthesizer anyway?’. Charting its history and cultural footprint, synth player Laurie Black takes us on a TED-style journey through the instrument that redefined popular music. Sink or SING!
Moonage Rhapsody
The Voodoo Rooms, 1-17 Aug (not 4, 11), 7.50pm
The music of David Bowie and Freddie Mercury soundtrack this ode to two titans of popular culture. Cabaret artists Aidan Sadler and Natasha Panas serve up a mix of hits and B-sides alike.
Whoever said choir was boring? Amelie Peters and Interactive Theatre International present a show that’ll get you belting your heart out. Whether you’ve been stood up or let down, this cathartic show shows how singing in a group can help you get things o your chest.
Photo: Alexis D Lea
Photo: Jiksaw
Bernie Dieter
Image: courtesy of the artist
Photo: Jonny Bosworth
Laurie Black Vetted
Photo: astockshot
Sink or SING!
Frisky’s Reshu e
Photo: Alexis Dubus
Moonage Rhapsody
Top Picks: Kids
From turning movement into music to dazzling aerial delights, there’s something for every young festival lover
Monsterrrr! with Trygve Wakenshaw
Assembly George Square Gardens, 31 Jul-17 Aug (not 6, 11), 12pm
A stupendously silly show for ages five and up from Edinburgh Comedy Award Nominee Trygve Wakenshaw. Monsterrrr is a cheeky, hairy mischief-maker who just wants to fit in. A playful, chaotic hour of clowning, theatre, and family fun.
You’ll See…
Pleasance Courtyard, 30 Jul-24
Aug (not 4, 11, 18), 12pm
James Joyce’s epic tale of one day in Dublin comes alive in this playful, inventive show for ages eight and up. With live performance, paper design and original music, it reimagines Ulysses for all.
You’re an Instrument!
Pleasance Courtyard, 30 Jul-25
Aug (not 5, 13, 19), 10.30am
A magical, musical science adventure where people become instruments. Two scientists lead a hilarious, interactive journey turning movement into music using the exciting technology of AirSticks. Suitable for all ages.
GO!
ZOO Southside, 12-24 Aug (not 18), 10am
Corps In Situ presents a high-energy performance blending dance, world-class martial arts, and tech. Two performers meet, challenge, and connect in a dynamic, playful duel. Set in a dojo, this thrilling, all-ages show celebrates movement, rhythm, and the power of human connection.
The Unlikely Friendship of Feather Boy and Tentacle Girl
Assembly Roxy, 4-17 Aug (not 6, 13), 11.25am
Vee Smith and Sadiq Ali soar, spin, and discover their true selves. A dazzling aerial show about identity, transformation, and belonging, for ages eight and up.
Heebie Jeebies
French Institute in Scotland, 1-25 Aug (not 11, 18), 11am
Meet the Heebie Jeebies – tiny, magical creatures you’ve never seen, until now! Join them and their insect puppet friends on a seasonal adventure to save the day. With Gaelic, French, and English storytelling, puppetry, and live music, this charming show for children under six sparks wonder and environmental awareness.
Photo: André Symann
Photo: Emile Zile
Photo: Bohumil kostohryz
Photo: Emilija Jefremova Monsterrrr
You’re an Instrument!
Photo: Tommy Ga-Ken Wan
The Unlikely Friendship…
You’ll See… GO!
Image: Rachel Al-Izzi
Heebie Jeebies
Top Picks: Dance and Circus
Immerse yourself into worlds of imaginative storytelling, from Afrofuturist performance
to the migration of birds
through warm temperatures
Assembly @ Dance Base, 12-24 Aug (not 18, 19), 1.15pm
Choreography, live cello and vocals combine for a show that charts castor oil’s legacy as a historic natural remedy. A journey of corporeal reconnection from Mele Broomes and Simone Seales.
The Genesis
Assembly Hall, 31 Jul-25 Aug (not 6, 11, 18), 12.30pm
An international cast pays homage to the Edinburgh Fringe’s commitment to human connection. Copenhagen Collective combine world-class acrobatics with light and sound design for a thrilling hour of storytelling.
Balfour Reparations
Summerhall, 31 Jul-25 Aug (not 11, 19), 4.30pm
Farah Saleh’s Afrofuturist performance lecture set in 2045 blends reality and fantasy and holds a lens up to the UK’s colonial history in Palestine. Expect audience participation in this near-future committee meeting that focuses on early 20th Century Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary Arthur James Balfour.
Pickled Republic
Summerhall, 31 Jul-25 Aug (not 11, 18)
Ruxandra Cantir invites us to this surreal theatrical cabaret for adults. Into the jar we go, where pickles lament the passing of time while in stasis. Think poetry, masks and puppets.
Kathryn Gordon: A Journey of Flight Assembly @ Dance Base, 12-17 Aug, 2.30pm
Created in Shetland and inspired by bird migration, Kathryn Gordon’s mix of projections, choreography and Jenny Sturgeon’s live music takes flight. Against a minimalist backdrop of flowing white sheets, the show promises feelings of awe and nostalgia.
Women in Socks and Sandals
ZOO Southside, 1-10 Aug, 1.20pm
What happens when women enter a world created by men? A feminist revision of hit Danish show M.I.S. All Night Long from the show’s original producers DON GNU.
Photo: Chloe Tallack
Photo: Andy Catlin
Photo: Christo er Brekne
Photo: Ruby Pluhar
Photo: David Poznic
Balfour Reparations
Pickled Republic
Women in Socks and Sandals
Photo: Lucas Chih-Peng Kao
Kathryn Gordon: A Journey of Flight
through warm temperatures
The Genesis
Top Picks: Edinburgh International Festival
The best music, dance and theatre arriving at the International Festival
Make It Happen
Festival Theatre, 30 Jul-9 Aug, times vary
Witness the dramatic rise and collapse of RBS, the biggest bank in the world, in this gripping new satire set in Edinburgh. Starring Brian Cox and Sandy Grierson, James Graham’s play explores ambition, greed, and the 2008 financial crash that shook the world.
Hanni Liang: Dreams
The Hub, 7 Aug, 8pm
Pianist Hanni Liang invites you into an immersive concert shaped by your own subconscious. Inspired by Debussy’s Rêverie, this interactive experience fuses classical music with audience reflections, transforming dreams into a living, evolving work of art in real time.
Dance People
Old College Quad, 7-10 Aug, 8.30pm
Dance People by Lebanese-French dance company Maqamat blurs the line between audience and performer. Choreographers Omar Rajeh and Mia Habis inspect power, culture, and creativity through dynamic, politically charged movement in this immersive outdoor performance.
Works and Days
The Lyceum, 7-10 Aug, times vary
FC Bergman’s latest wordless piece highlights our fading connection to the earth through stunning imagery, movement, and music. Integrating ancient rituals with modern life, it journeys through seasons and human rites, featuring elemental set design and original Vivaldi-inspired music.
The
Dan Daw Show
The Lyceum, 2-4 Aug, 8pm
In his bold International Festival debut, disabled Australian dancer Dan Daw reclaims power through kink, challenging societal norms with vulnerability and pride. The Dan Daw Show blends sensual choreography and raw theatre to look at shame, identity, and radical self-acceptance.
Up Late with Kathryn Joseph
The Hub, 9 Aug, 10pm
Scottish singer-songwriter Kathryn Joseph delivers late-night meditative vocals and rhythmic piano. Since winning Scottish Album of the Year in 2015, her music has evolved from intimate to intensely experimental. Joined by Lomond Campbell, she investigates darker territories, merging vulnerability with raw beauty.
Photo: Shannyn Higgins for Rising
Photo: David_Vintiner
Photo: Yannick Blancard
Photo: EstherHaase
Photo: Marilena Vlachopoulou
Photo: Kurt Van der Elst
The Dan Daw Show Works and Days
Make It Happen
Dance People
Hanni Liang
Kathryn Joseph
Orpheus and Eurydice
Edinburgh Playhouse, 13-16 Aug, times vary
Opera Australia and Opera Queensland join forces with Circa. Featuring Iestyn Davies and Samantha Clarke, this European premiere melds soaring vocals, haunting visuals, and aerial acrobatics with music from the Scottish Chamber Orchestra and a chorus from Scottish Opera.
Faustus in Africa!
The Lyceum, 20-23 Aug, 7.30pm
Faustus in Africa! revisits the classic tale through the lens of colonialism and climate crisis. Directed by William Kentridge, this assured revival, 30 years a er its original premiere, combines Handspring Puppet Company’s acclaimed puppetry with animation and music.
Cutting the Tightrope
Church Hill Theatre, 14-17 Aug, 7.30pm
A collection of short political plays confronting censorship, resistance, and the role of the arts in turbulent times. Following a sell-out run in London, this unflinching production brings global struggles to the stage, demanding attention, amplifying silenced voices, and celebrating the power of artistic freedom.
Mary, Queen of Scots
Festival Theatre, 15-17 Aug, times vary
Renaissance meets punk in Scottish Ballet’s Mary, Queen of Scots – a reimagining of two rival queens bound by blood and divided by power. As Elizabeth I faces death, memories of Mary haunt her. Choreographed by Sophie Laplane, this world premiere mixes ambition, betrayal, and striking design into unforgettable dance theatre.
Figures in Extinction
Festival Theatre, 22-24 Aug, times vary
Crystal Pite, Simon McBurney and Nederlands Dans Theater stage a powerful fusion of dance, sound, and theatre confronting the climate crisis. With affecting imagery and urgent dialogue, this collaboration seeks reflection and connection amid a world on the brink.
Cutting the Tightrope
Figures in Extinction
Orpheus and Eurydice
Mary, Queen of Scots
Faustus in Africa!
Photo: Rahi
Rezvani
Photo: David Monteith-Hodge
Photo: Keith Saunders
Photo: Mihaela
Bodlovic
Image: Courtesy of the company
WHO’S READY FOR A LEAP THROUGH TIME?
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Not Her First Rodeo
Hot o the heels of her hit ITV2 comedy Transaction, Jordan Gray talks about her return to the Fringe and her commitment to clowning
Words: Francesca Peschier
It’s been a big three years for Jordan Gray since her Edinburgh smash hit show Is it a Bird? resulted in awards galore, spawning a Channel 4 special and the development of her web series Transaction into a full ITV sitcom. Performing naked on Friday Night Live and “playing the keyboard with a part of the body not traditionally employed for that,” Gray won the hearts of many and the unhinged fury of a vocal few. From “not being able to talk about the death threats for a long time,” Gray has moulded fear into a punchline for this year’s Is That A C*ck In Your Pocket, Or Are You Just Here To Kill Me?
Laughter is cathartic, and Gray wears her ability to brush things o like a rhinestone cowgirl. “I’m a cartoon, and bullets bounce o cartoons,” she shrugs. “I’ve got no agenda apart from being funny. I’m going to do an hour of stand-up, sing some songs, and as I’m a transgender woman I’ll probably talk about that. Oh and that I thought some people were going to try and murder me.”
Gray is a rockstar with the distilled energy of 18 toddlers in a (beautifully tailored) trenchcoat. She’s written two books, released 10 albums and survived reality TV, but it’s in comedy she’s found the magic link. There is universality in her specificity that invites instant connection, from metalhead crowds going wild at Download to her jokes about “experiences they’ve never heard before,” to her recent Soho previews where she was delighted to see about a “20% increase” in trans audiences. “My dream has always been to see
Photo: Dylan Woodley
“I’m a cartoon, and bullets bounce off cartoons”
transgender people at my shows, nudging each other, going ‘hey, that’s us! We do that!’”
Her brilliance lies in finding the sweet spot between punching down and pointing out the funny grains of truth in stereotypes. It only takes a surface scratch to reveal the absurdity of transphobia. “Sometimes I think that’s why there’s so much anger: when you’ve dug yourself so deep into something clearly ridiculous, it’s harder to let go. I can push forward with ridiculous analogies, but they think I’m serious. They believe I really think that Daylight Savings Day is a reasonable parallel for understanding gender dysmorphia.” Perhaps the problem is that bigots just don’t have a sense of humour.
Gray’s zealous commitment to clowning in our hostile environment feels like an act of resistance. Threats towards trans folk have become hyper-normalised, online abuse shrugged o as inevitable. “I once put it to the test tweeting ‘I’m having a bag of crisps’,” says Gray. “And someone immediately replied with some of the vilest things I’ve ever heard.” It’s a constant background noise, but luckily Gray is louder; “When you know there are people out there who literally don’t want you to be alive, it amplifies that little voice saying ‘shut up, everybody hates you.’ You’re always battling that – thinking ‘oh god, shall I just make jokes about dogs for an hour?’.” She pauses. “Although, to be fair, I think Ricky Gervais has the monopoly on that.”
Underrepresentation can o en result in undue pressure on individuals to speak for their community. Gray is clear that she’s not interested in showing “the trauma everyone expects from work with trans characters.” She’s keen to point out that Transaction’s protagonist Olivia (played by Gray) is “a dick-
head. I mean, a dickhead you want to succeed, but definitely a dickhead.” A character who is allowed to be morally ambiguous, in “a sitcom dedicated to people who stack shelves for a living.” She warms to her proclamation: “Sometimes trans people fall over banana skins, and we need that representation as well!” Truly, an intersectional manifesto where we’re all in on the joke.
SHOW Jordan Gray: Is That a C*ck in Your Pocket, or Are You Just Here to Kill Me?
VENUE: Assembly George Square Gardens TIME: 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 6, 12, 19) , 9.05pm
Photo: Dylan Woodley
Let Your Freak Flag Fly
Su Mi and Cabbage the Clown, two acts from the BIGHEAD
Comedy roster, explain why they’ve found a liberating home at the alternative company
Words: Oscar Lund
“Iwanted to be weirder. I want to be more of a freak!” Stand-up comedian-turned-drag clown, Su Mi is speaking about her journey down the alt-comedy path. She says, “With stand-up comedy, as much as I love it, there was so much more I wanted to do.” Pushing against norms in stand-up, Su finds acceptance in the drag scene alongside her fellow troupe member, clown, and friend, Eliza Nelson who goes by Cabbage the Clown.
“Even though I am a clown, I think my work is a little bit outside of traditional clowning and more in the realm of drag,” says Cabbage. Coming from two ends of a spectrum, Su and Cabbage meet somewhere in-between comedy and drag, both taking something from each other’s background in their acts.
Su sees the drag scene as a liberating space, saying “I found so many really nice, queer, crazy spaces where people wouldn’t just be freaked out by [my act].” Embracing her newfound creative freedom, Su Mi throws her audience through a whirlwind of surreal non-conformist punk madness in her Fringe debut THISMOTHERPHUCKER
Photo:
Lina Sakovi č
“I found so many really nice, queer, crazy spaces where people wouldn’t just be freaked out by [my act]”
Su Mi
Likewise, Cabbage’s step in the direction of comedy and clowning allows them to be more experimental with their drag act. “When you put something on stage in the drag world, it’s like a finished product, whereas in the clown and comedy scene, it’s all about getting used to failure,” says Cabbage. Their show Cinemadrome combines glamorous outfits with the misery of working as a minimum wage cinema usher in an hour-long parody of cinematic history.
The two are quick to praise Charlie Ralph, the big head of BIGHEAD Comedy. “What’s great about Charlie is that he really champions alternative comedy and clowning,” says Su, happy to have found a production company “solely for freaks like us.” Under the banner of BIGHEAD Comedy, Su’s and Cabbage’s shows will join six others for this year’s Edinburgh Fringe.
Squeezed into the BIGHEAD clown car with Su and Cabbage is Ozzy Algar who plays a clairvoyant laundress in Speed Queen – a narrative-driven character comedy. Other narrative acts are more personal, with Pedro Leandro’s So Animal following the winding road of his life as he explores his own sexuality and need for acceptance – all told with a self-deprecating grin. Bebe Cave steers her comedic story, Christbride, in a historical direction, following a medieval tween who, sick of all living men, seeks marriage to a man she will never have to actually talk to – Christ himself.
Fighting over the radio are Holly Spillar and Anna Hale with their musical comedy shows. Spillar channels her financial frustrations in Tall Child through a stand-up routine with a live soundtrack delivered via a loop pedal. Hale’s Control Freak employs her vocal and piano chords in an obsessively curated medley of mirth.
And, getting mud on the back seat is Rosa Garland whose boundary pushing physical comedy, Primal Bog, interrogates the relationship between queer sexuality and aesthetic taboos.
Expanding boundaries and telling unconventional stories is what BIGHEAD Comedy aims to bring to the Fringe through its alt-comedy troupe. Cabbage is keen to point out the importance of this aim for the alt-drag scene as a whole, saying, “There’s so little alternative and AFAB bodied drag in the public eye… some people don’t identify what I do as drag.”
Mainstream culture can o en view drag as rigidly defined. Alt-drag acts prove that this is far from the truth. Drag queens, kings, and things are all part of the equation and increasing the representation of alternative drag acts helps expand common understandings of drag as a broad church or, in the case of Su and Cabbage, a big tent.
SHOW Su Mi: THISMOTHERPHUCKER
VENUE: Underbelly, Cowgate
TIME: 31 Jul-24 Aug (not 12, 19) , 6.40pm
SHOW Cabbage the Clown: Cinemadrome
VENUE: Underbelly, George Square
TIME: 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 12, 19) , 9.45pm
Photo: Paul Gilbey
Su Mi
Good Grief
Returning to the Fringe for the first time since her ill-fated debut, Thanyia Moore reflects on the importance of finding levity in moments of trauma
Words: Deborah Chu
Photo: Rebecca Need-Menear
In classic fashion, we’ve started with weather chat. “We’re going to have a rubbish Edinburgh,” groans Thanyia Moore. We’re meeting to discuss her new show, August, during an unnerving run of back-to-back sunshine; which, we agree, can only mean we’ll pay for it down the line.
But Moore is no stranger to di cult experiences at the festival. The comedian’s latest hour concerns her particularly traumatic Fringe debut in 2022, when she had a miscarriage on day one of her previews. Five days later, doctors discovered she had a life-threatening ectopic pregnancy. Moore returned to London for medical treatment but ultimately came back to finish her run. “I don’t think I had accepted what had just happened to me,” she says, “and Edinburgh’s a good place to forget about everything.” Despite her team’s wholehearted support, she felt guilt over the wasted expense, and internalised stigma around her “female issue” letting them down, so she initially lied about what had happened: “I told them that I pulled a muscle in my groin and I just started limping!”
Even amid crisis, Moore recognised the creative potential. “When I was in the hospital, before I even knew it was a miscarriage, I was like, ‘I’m going to make this a show,’” she says. Partly she was driven by a desire for answers: “Whenever something bad happens to me, I’m obsessed with trying to find the reason and how I can learn from it.” But equally, she felt the need to do something productive with her grief. Moore’s unsure whether she’s fully processed the events of 2022 yet, but returning to them has, at the very least, reinforced her confidence in her creative powers. “I can say, ‘look, it was a traumatic experience but look at what I’ve made from it. We’re going to touch people who are grieving and hopefully make them understand that there’s no one way to grieve.” On this point, she gets very animated: “Babes, if you want to grieve and do a skydive, you skydive the shit out of yourself, okay? And if you want to grieve and sit in a tree, you sit in the biggest fucking tree that you need to sit in.”
No matter the forecast, Moore still promises light and levity. “I think one of the beautiful
things about being a comedian is you can take sad moments and find the joy in them. What I love about my show is that, yeah, we touch on some deep moments, but I think the audience should trust that I can bring you out of those. And by the end of it, we’ll be laughing. Maybe crying a little bit, but we’ll be laughing mostly.”
“We’re going to touch people who are grieving and hopefully make them understand that there’s no one way to grieve”
So, a er everything that’s happened, how does it feel to be returning to the Fringe this year? “I had zero desire to go back,” Moore deadpans; however, her aspiration is to turn her story into a film, and the best way to do that is to have a presence at the biggest arts festival in the world. Now her feelings about returning have changed somewhat – for all its universal themes, August is also a uniquely Edinburgh story. “I think there’ll be something special about what I’m talking about, where I was at the time and what was going on. And everyone in the room will probably have just walked down that road or went to that co ee shop.”
But also, she’s looking forward to closure for herself. “I’m looking forward to going back to certain places that I went to, to hide from the Fringe,” Moore says. “I want to be like, last time we were here was di erent. Now we can wrap that up with a nice little bow and say, that’s done now.”
SHOW Thanyia Moore: August
VENUE: Pleasance Courtyard
TIME: 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 11) , 5.40pm
Local Heroes
Comedians Jack Traynor, Ayo Adenekan, Amanda Hursy and Hannah Morton on what to expect from their inaugural hours
Words: Louis Cammell
While the Edinburgh Fringe seems intent on pricing out home-grown talent, year upon year a stronghold of Scottish comedians continues to find its way to the festival by any means necessary. This time around, it’s thanks to lifelines like the newly formed Brass Tacks Debut Hour Fund, the Keep it Fringe Fund and the Best in Class Bursary that a fresh crop of comics, forged in the city’s year-round clubs, are able to burst onto the scene. Among them are the likes of Cumbernauld comedian Jack Traynor, Edinburgh’s own Ayo Adenekan, and Glasgow comics Hannah Morton and Amanda Hursy.
Jack Traynor has quickly built himself an international audience online by ripping the piss out of other comics on the local scene. Although that might sound more like the way to get your lights punched out than a career path, he’s done it all as part of Roast Battle, an international league of comedy insults where lines like “Ryan [Cullen] looks like the alien that abducted me” has introduced the world to his signature style: a chaotic mix of
Jack Traynor
Photo: Two Trolleys
self-deprecation and absurdist imagery that he describes as “two raccoons scrapping in a bin.” His razor-sharp debut hour Before I Forget promises a “back-to-basics” approach to stand-up wherein a good joke trumps any and all pressure to contrive a level of polish or self-reflection that just isn’t in his nature. “You might not be getting some thespian piece where I delve into my personality and we come to the conclusion that I’ve got some mental illness or something like that,” says Traynor in reference to what he feels is a growing trend of comedians aiming for awards first and laughs second. “I probably do [have one], but I try to make it funny.”
“What started as an intimidating challenge turned into an unexpected kind of freedom”
Amanda Hursy
Traynor is part of a collective called Wholesome Prison Blues, which sees him gig in UK prisons alongside comics like Amanda Hursy. Hursy is no stranger to a prison cell, as she reveals in her own debut Fringe show Carted A er a grand total of seven arrests, the East Glasgow lassie had enough of having to put her personality behind bars. The cu s are o in her show about being continually underestimated, pigeonholed and – as she discovered young, when she received an Olympic ‘School of Sport’ scholarship – held to a standard that doesn’t apply to her wealthier, more privileged counterparts. “The show is about the absurdity
Amanda Hursy
Photo: Francesca Morrison
15 SHOWS
7 VENUES
EDINBURGH 2025
LONDON’S MOST VIBRANT PRODUCER OF NEW THEATRE, COMEDY AND CABARET IS BACK WITH THIS LUSH LOT.
of my multiple arrests. Learning to laugh at my mistakes and challenging the judgement I’ve faced throughout my life,” she says. “Taking stand-up into prisons wasn’t just about cracking jokes, it was about stepping straight into fear, owning the moment, and proving that comedy has no boundaries… What started as an intimidating challenge turned into an unexpected kind of freedom. Because when you can get a gym hall full of inmates roaring with laughter, you know you can take your comedy anywhere.” What was she in for? You’ll have to buy a ticket to find out.
But while Hursy is unfazed by the back of a police van, for Ayo Adenekan, even the back of a bus can be a moral conundrum. While the Fringe might draw in audiences from all
over the map, an Edinburgh upbringing has taught the 23 -year-old that for the other 11 months of the year, it can seem like he is one of less than a dozen Black people in the overwhelmingly white city. Black Mediocrity deals with the consequences of that lack of diversity (like overthinking what vibe you’re giving o on public transport) from the point of view of lived experience. In just two years on the circuit, Adenekan has cemented himself as a staple of the open mic comedy scene and came third in Gilded Balloon’s So You Think You’re Funny? competition last year, a er Sir Billy Connolly Spirit of Glasgow Award-winner Rosco McClelland urged him to enter. Delivered with a lightness of touch and a breezy, laidback attitude, Adenekan takes a
Ayo Adenekan
Photo: Beth Moar
potentially tense topic and di uses it with a few well chosen punchlines. The lens, at the end of the day, is most o en turned on himself as a Black, queer 20-something just trying to figure things out.
If you like your existential crises a little more extreme, Hannah Morton’s Cha Cha Real Smooth lets the part of her brain that says, “What the fuck am I doing here?” do the bulk of the talking. A er years of side hustling as a kids’ party entertainer, Morton is inviting her audience to attend a common scene in her life: A five year old’s birthday party at which she, as her alter ego Hannah Banana, is monstrously hungover. The show is an ode to the gig economy by a self-professed ‘accidental’ stand-up. A playwright first, “I’ve done [stand-up] the opposite way around,” she says. As opposed to building up her show five, 10, 20 minutes at a time, Morton penned the whole hour without having touched the stand-up circuit. It’s a huge risk, but one that paid o when she stormed its first performance at the Glasgow International Comedy Festival. The response has emboldened her to bring it to the Fringe, with a few preparatory stand-up gigs along the way. But although she’s aiming for match-fitness, she fully intends to go method on a few of those scripted hangovers…
SHOW Jack Traynor: Before I Forget
VENUE: Pleasance Courtyard
TIME: 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 11) , 9.55pm
SHOW Amanda Hursy: Carted
VENUE: Gilded Balloon Patter House
TIME: 30 Jul-25 Aug, 6.20pm
SHOW Ayo Adenekan: Black Mediocrity
VENUE: Monkey Barrel Comedy
TIME: 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 13), 1.30pm
SHOW Hannah Morton: Cha Cha Real Smooth
VENUE: Gilded Balloon at Appleton Tower
TIME: 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 11, 18) , 5pm
Hannah Morton
Image: courtesy of Gilded Balloon
Divine Comedy
The writer and director of the cult-classic Comic Strip
films explains what audiences can expect from the exclusive screenings at the Fringe
Words: Si Hawkins
Formed at London’s legendary Comedy Store in 1980, The Comic Strip launched household names – Rik Mayall, Ade Edmondson, Dawn French, Jennifer Saunders, Robbie Coltrane –inspired a landmark sitcom, The Young Ones, and made many memorable films over 30 years. The man behind it? Peter Richardson, who is bringing their finest films to this year’s Edinburgh Fringe, alongside some famous friends. And about time too.
The Comic Strip started on stage, but never did the Fringe?
Not really. Well, Rik Mayall established his poet character there. He went to a reading and started doing this awful poem, and they were hiding behind their hands, trying not to laugh –they wanted to respect poets, no matter how awful! We’ll be running a best-of tribute to Rik in Edinburgh.
Image: courtesy of the artist
Bad News
How will these shows work?
We’re doing five nights, with [host] Robin Ince, guests, Q&As, showing a dozen films from around 45 we made, di erent each night – the ones that still make people laugh, that really deliver.
You were hugely progressive, but The Comedy Store, then your Comic Strip club, were owned by Paul Raymond, the porn baron. We were just renting a venue o him; because we wanted to avoid that safe sort of pub theatre. It was a challenge for people to come into this naughty, glitzy, bad-sex place – the dark corridors of Raymond’s Revuebar. Then you’d hopefully surprise them with something interesting and fun.
Is that why you called it The Comic Strip?
No – in fact a few days before we opened our club, Paul Raymond said, “You can’t say ‘Strip’ here,” because he never used that word, he always said ‘Revue’. All the advertising was ‘Comic Strip’ so we negotiated. The huge poster outside, we took the ‘S’ o . The Comic Trip.
Superstars showed up anyway?
Nigel [Planer] and I did a sketch called ACDC10, where I was hijacking a plane: “What’s the in-flight movie, you fucker?” “It’s Kramer vs Kramer, with Dustin Ho man, Meryl Streep,” “Don’t give me that feelgood shit.” As I’m doing it one night I think, ‘God that guy looks like… it is Dustin Ho man,’ front row of this strip theatre. Two nights later he came back, with Jack Nicholson.
Robin Williams used to come just before midnight, “can I go on? I’ve got David Bowie with me, George Harrison.” We’re closing in two minutes!
You, Nigel, Rik and Ade became an iconic quartet in several films, so it seemed odd that you weren’t in The Young Ones – a er a row with BBC management?
Listen, I would have been crap in The Young Ones. I was busy getting the Comic Strip films going, I didn’t want to do sitcoms; I always wanted us to be a modern Ealing Films. We were lucky, coinciding with the beginning of Channel Four. They said, ‘Okay, give us six films.’ ITV and BBC would never have looked at it.
The first one, Five Go Mad in Dorset, went out on Channel 4’s opening night – you’d actually licensed The Famous Five from Enid Blyton? Blyton herself would probably be turning in her grave! Her estate, they arrived at Channel Four the night before and wanted to throw an injunction at them: ‘Right, we want to see this filthy piece of work’. So they turned the film on in the boardroom, and gradually they’re starting to snigger behind the legal papers: ‘Okay, there’s nothing we’re going to do about that.’ Laughter won the day.
Such great casts: Alexei Sayle in Strike!, you and Keith Allen in The Bullshitters, Peter Cook, Miranda Richardson, Kate Bush, Stephen Mangan. Stephen Frears directed several films? He had no idea about comedy, Stephen, but was very helpful before my first feature film, The Supergrass – it played in 300 cinemas, pretty good going. I’ve done a new cut of that, a new cut of [mock rock doc] Bad News, bookended with us playing the Donington festival, and slight changes elsewhere. They’re all shot on film, no laugh track, so it’s a proper film experience.
You’re clearly still immersed in it. I’ve got about three scripts ready to go. I’d love to do another film.
SHOW The Comic Strip Presents...
VENUE: Just the Tonic Nucleus
TIME: 2, 3, 8, 9, 10 Aug, 1pm
Image: Andy Hollingworth Archive
Peter Richardson
How To Win Against History
Edinburgh Comedy Allstars
BATSU! Super Sunday
Bernie Dieter's Club Kabarett
Mario The Maker Magician
Garry Starr: Classic Penguins
Mythos: Ragnarök
Sophie’s Surprise 29th
Something Good
Joe Tracini discusses the value of honesty, life with BPD and the five-year journey to his Fringe show
Words: Kirstyn Smith
Oen misdiagnosed, undiagnosed, ignored and stigmatised, borderline personality disorder is, according to Joe Tracini, “the emotional equivalent of giving an eight year old a job and a car and saying, ‘Good luck.’”
“It’s absolutely exhausting. Tiredness is linked to physical exertion, and actual events you do in the outside world. I think people don’t understand how tiring it is to exist in a mind that is a hostile place.”
Photo: Rob Trendy
Joe Tracini
Photo: Richard Jarmy
The actor, comedian and former British Junior Magical Champion discussed his experiences living with BPD in his 2024 documentary Me and the Voice in My Head. It went on to win two awards at the Grierson British Documentary Awards, and it’s a piece of work that is a great introduction to both Tracini himself, and borderline personality disorder. It’s unflinching, and honest, something Tracini is almost obsessed with being.
“There’s safety in what you know, even if what you know is kicking you in the nuts"
“It’s the only thing that keeps me going,” he says on an early-morning Zoom call. He seems in a good place – the sun is shining, and his dogs keep popping by to say hello – but those of us with BPD know that looks can be deceiving. (“All the way through last year I wasn’t well,” he admits later. “It’s only since the beginning of the year that I’ve really started to settle down a little bit”). He is funny and warm, and exactly the kind of person I’d feel comfortable explaining the ins and outs of BPD in an honest but not pandering way.
“I was very lucky that I was able to be that honest on telly,” he says. “If I feel something, I shouldn’t be the only person who knows about it – especially not if it’s a bad thing. I’m not going to hurt myself, but the only way I can be sure of that is if I get a second opinion, so being honest is so important.”
In his documentary, Tracini’s on a journey to reignite his stand-up career, working on and staging a show that he first wanted to do before the pandemic hit. That show is the one he’s bringing to the Fringe, Ten Things I Hate About Me, but the first time he tried to perform it, he had a panic attack and couldn’t do it. I question
what it is about performance, which he’s been doing in one form or another since he was a young child, that he keeps returning to.
“There’s safety in what you know, even if what you know is kicking you in the nuts,” he laughs. “I was in such a hopeful place when I decided to go to Edinburgh five years ago, but I lost all that hope.” When you lose hope, he explains, the first place you go looking for it is the last place you le it, “which is why, despite the panic attacks, I kept coming back.”
When we talk about the fact that the comedy-show-about-mental-illness market is quite saturated, it seems clear that Tracini is keen to quash the usual expectations that these kinds of shows can engender.
“Quite intentionally, the whole show is centered around the fact that I want the whole audience to feel comfortable,” he says, “because I’m aware that talking about the sort of things that I’m talking about, while having mental illness, can be uncomfortable.” How does he achieve this? “The first half of the show is an incredibly detailed trigger warning for the second half of the show.”
Tracini says that he’s not proud of his BPD; neither is he ashamed of it – “It wasn’t a decision, and it continues not to be.” But the fact that he spoke about his illness, which led to more opportunities, means that his career and his illness became intrinsically linked. This show is a way of drawing a line under the past five years of his life and helping him to move on. Yes, he touches on the bad stu , but the point isn’t to dwell on it.
“All of the worst moments of my life were just before something good happened,” he says. “And the worst things in my life didn’t happen, cos I didn’t kill myself, I’m still here. And that’s not a shock. People can see that I’m still here. So I make sure that I focus on the stu that did happen, not the stu that didn’t.”
NICK HORNEDO WATCH THIS WHEN YOU GET HOME 2:25PM • 30 July-24 Aug • Underbelly
ALFIE PACKHAM MY APOLOGIES TO THE CHEF 7:15PM • 30 July-24 Aug • Underbelly
SEATON SMITH TRAUMA BONDING
8:30PM • 30 July-24 Aug • Pleasance
BECKY UMBERS PUT THAT CAT BACK IN THE BAG 8:40PM • 30 July-24 Aug • Assembly
ELI MATTHEWSON NIGHT TERROR 8:50PM • 30 July-24 Aug • Underbelly
CALLAHAN SODA POP 10:05PM • 30 July-24 Aug • Assembly
Spectrum of Laughs
Comedians Narin Özenci and Ria Lina discuss how autism can be viewed through di erent lenses in the same genre
Words: Kat Mokrynski
In recent years, the topic of being diagnosed with autism has been on the rise for comedians’ shows at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. Several shows last year directly referenced autism, including Joe Wells: Daddy Autism, Josephine Lacey: Autism Mama and Mark Nicholas: This Is Not the Autistic You Are Looking For. But there are some comedians, including Narin Özenci and Ria Lina, who have been incorporating the neurodivergent aspects of their lives into shows for years, well before it became a trend.
In Narin Oz: Inner Child(ish), Özenci takes on the character of her alter ego, Narin Oz, whose only friend is Dr Fecal Matter, an inflatable emoji in the style of Wilson from Cast Away The show, an inflation of a true story, is meant to poke fun at self-help seminars, as Özenci found that they didn’t help her, instead finding solace in the art of clowning. In Özenci’s own words, “The show is a spoof of a self-help seminar teaching people how to find their self-worth by recreating scenes from the Cast Away movie, but it goes tits up as well, because I’m mocking these gurus.”
When talking about how Inner Child(ish) will consist of relaxed performances, Özenci lets us is on a secret – “All of my shows have been relaxed, and I had no idea, just because of the way I am!” As someone who struggles with too many sensory aspects, Özenci has “always
Photo:
Steve Ullathorne
Narin Özenci
Photo: Steve Ullathorne
allowed people to do what they need to do” in her shows, including letting people come and go as they please or even get some rest in the back row. This year, her show is o cially a relaxed show, with Özenci creating a storyboard to put on her website for prospective audience members to look at.
In contrast to Inner Child(ish), which focuses more on clowning, Ria Lina’s show, Riabellion, is pure stand-up comedy, with Lina coming to the realisation that she wants to rebel a er divorcing her husband of 18 years, finally discovering who she is a er years of trying to fit in. When she was diagnosed with autism in 2012, Lina “was petrified that people would find out,” so she didn’t tell anyone. But, once she was outed by someone on social media, Lina was shocked at how, “With one diagnosis, I’ve gone from normal to special needs and that changes how you see me. Now you think I’m not even as capable.” She confesses that she found it really hard at first to write about her autism, saying, “It wasn’t a part of me when I started, even though it was always a part of me.” It’s taken her time to accept herself and her autism diagnosis, but now she is learning how to write for herself, “through the eyes of close family and friends.”
Lina separates those diagnosed with autism into two categories – BC, or “before it was cool,” representing her generation where people tended to keep their diagnosis hidden, and AD, “a er diagnosis,” with a new generation of neurodivergent people being proud of and documenting their journeys. In Lina’s words, “I’ve been sitting on the side with my bandwagon, and everyone is like, ‘You’re a freak.’ And then one day, I went, ‘Can you watch my bandwagon?’ And when I came back, everyone was playing on my bandwagon. And I’m like, ‘That’s my bandwagon.’ And they were like, “Yeah, well, we’re playing with it now.’ ‘Can I get on the bandwagon?’ ‘No, there’s no room for you. You’re weird. Go away.’”
It is fascinating to see how the subject of autism can be brought into the genre of comedy in di erent ways while still expressing the same message – autistic comedians have and always will exist and deserve their place just as much as any neurotypical comedian.
SHOW Ria Lina: Riabellion
VENUE: Monkey Barrel Comedy
TIME: 28 Jul-24 Aug (not 14, 21) , 2.25pm
SHOW Narin Oz: Inner Child(ish)
VENUE: Just the Tonic at The Mash House
TIME: 31 Jul-24 Aug (not 12) , 4pm
Ria Lina
9.45pm01 - 23 AUG
Thinking Funny
So You Think You’re Funny? alumni give us the lowdown on their must-see comics at this year’s Fringe
Nate Kitch
Something Di erent!!!!!, 30 Jul-25 Aug
The PBH Free Fringe is essential for finding new stu : Caitriona Dowden, Mark Dean Quinn and Ali Brice all have new exciting shows but Auditory Awakenings with Mr Tingles in the House ASMR starring Yogie Belle (PBH’s Free Fringe @ Bannermans) is something I can’t wait to see, I’ve seen Yogie doing short spots and laughed so hard I went to another place. With seemingly no Consignia this year, I’m eager to catch (or not, as our shows clash) The Mayor and His Daughter (Assembly Roxy) – we’ve crossed paths on the circuit and I always enjoy watching their absurd theatrical oddity; something fresh for those seeking a break from the norm…maybe I’ll leave my own show again to catch the end of theirs? Or maybe I’ll do that anyway?
Ciara O’Connor
Best of So You Think You’re Funny?, 30 Jul-25 Aug
I adore Sharon Wanjohi (Pleasance Courtyard), she’s so high energy and every time I gig with her, she manages to outdress the entire room. Aside from being the most glamorous comedian at the Fringe, Sharon’s already doing bits on BBC, Comedy Central and ITV and I’m so excited to see her debut hour this Fringe. Every time I see Ayoade Bamgboye (Pleasance Courtyard) perform, she takes over a room. Whether it’s a solo show or part of a
Nate Kitch
Ciara O’Connor
mixed bill, Ayoade manages to turn the room upside down and it feels like you get to crawl inside her brain for the duration. Everything Ayoade does is so unpredictable – Swings and Roundabouts will be an eccentric and memorable standout for anyone’s Fringe watchlist.
Christopher Donovan and Laurie Brewster
Fun With Bad Boys, 30 Jul-25 Aug
Laurie: I have a big spreadsheet full of shows I want to see, so it’s hard to just choose a couple! My good friend Kelly Rickard is bringing her debut to The Stand. She is such a natural on stage with a real warmth about her. People should also go and see Eva Peroni, who’s doing a split bill (Hoots @ Potterrow), as well as a late night compilation show at Gilded Balloon called Hot Comedy. I’ve gigged with Eva recently and she is super engaging with some belting punchlines.
Christopher: There’s so many shows I’m excited to see. I want August here already! My recommendation is Sophie Garrad’s debut Poor Little Rich Girl (Pleasance Courtyard). She’s completely hilarious and destined for great things.
Sophia Wren
Princess Melancholy, 30 Jul-25 Aug
Kyla Cobbler (Underbelly Cowgate) is bottled lightning. She’s hilarious, razor sharp and has an irresistible charm that radiates out to the audience who are all at once falling in love and peeing their pants laughing.
Irish lunatic John Spillane (Hoots @ The Apex) is a wonderfully unhinged whirlwind improviser that walks on stage with NOTHING prepared. It’s mischievous, absurd and defies predictability. Comedy alchemy. Sinead Walsh (Just the Tonic @ The Mash House) is an absolute gem of a comedian and human! Sinead’s comedy is charming, laugh-out-loud, hilariously self-deprecating and e ortlessly relatable.
Kathleen Hughes
Twig (WIP), Scottish Comedy Festival @ Waverley Bar, 1-17 Aug
This year, I can’t wait to see Ayo Adenekan’s debut, Black Mediocrity (Monkey Barrel). Ayo put on an incredible showing at SYTYF? 2024 and he’s flying right now as a comic – he’s original, hilarious, and he has a really welcoming, easy-
going vibe that makes an hour in his company a pleasure, on-stage or otherwise.
I’m also really excited to catch Yvonne Hughes (no relation, honest) at Gilded Balloon. Yvonne’s stand up is fresh and sincere and the story she’s telling – her journey living with cystic fibrosis – is something I’ve never heard discussed in comedy before. I love how she thinks and embraces experiences to turn them into engaging, candid, brilliant material.
SHOW So You Think You’re Funny? Competition – Heats
VENUE: Gilded Balloon Patter House
TIME: 13-20 Aug (not 19) , various times
SHOW So You Think You’re Funny? Competition – Grand Final
VENUE: Gilded Balloon at Appleton Tower
TIME: 21 Aug, 7.30pm
Photo: Daryll Buchanan
Kathleen Hughes
Christopher Donovan and Laurie Brewster
Image: courtesy of Gilded Balloon
Happy Returns
Cat Cohen su ered a stroke in 2023, which ended up derailing her Fringe run. Here, the Edinburgh Comedy Award winner talks about coming back with her most personal show yet
Words: Deborah Chu
Your latest show, Broad Strokes, is about the stroke you had in 2023, which led to the cancellation of your Edinburgh run. When did you know that you’d be turning that experience into material for a new show? Did that decision surprise you, or did it come quite naturally?
As soon as the doctor in the emergency room told me I was going to be okay, I was like… this is great material.
What was the process of creating the show like? Did you feel as though it helped you look at the experience in a di erent way?
The whole experience was so shocking and disorienting that as soon as I started to feel more like myself, I tried to pretend like it had never happened. I had to bury many feelings and fears in order to move on and get back to work. When I started to write this show in January, I realised how much I had to (and honestly still have to) process. It has been therapeutic, but also anxiety provoking at times. I’m still fine-tuning the show so it’s very much an ongoing journey. Ultimately I’m grateful for the experience because I definitely think this is my best work yet.
When I saw Come for Me at the Fringe last year, I was so struck by how you balanced a hilarious, self-obsessed stage persona
with genuine moments of vulnerability and self-awareness. Now that you’re focusing on a deeply personal story, how has that a ected your performance approach? Did you need to adjust that comedic persona, or does it actually serve the more intimate material you’re exploring?
Thank you!! I’m not quite sure… Right now I’m just working on getting the ideas down on paper… I’m sure the performance will evolve and find itself as the run begins.
When you came to the Fringe last year, you brought the show you were meant to perform before the cancellation. How did that feel to you, in light of all you experienced? How are you feeling about coming back this year with this story?
Very emotional!! Getting through my 2024 run a er having to postpone it was incredibly satisfying. It felt very full circle and I was super grateful. This year is going to be wild because I’ve never done a show that is SO brand new at the Fringe. I am ready to rock/roll.
SHOW Cat Cohen: Broad Strokes
VENUE: Pleasance Courtyard
TIME: 31 Jul-24 Aug (not 6, 12, 13, 19) , 9pm
Photo:
CHUNKY
WAKATI
MY MARLENE
Body Talk
Placing the body at the centre of their art, Betty Grumble and Suhui Hee explore how it becomes a tool for performance, activism, pleasure and more
Words: Xuanlin Tham
Speaking to Betty Grumble/Emma Maye Gibson and Suhui Hee, one is reminded that performance can be an antidote to the intense disembodiment of life under the many denials of late-stage capitalist culture. This Fringe, both artists illuminate the necessity of somatic attunement – for healing, and for transforming ourselves and each other in this political moment, through the body first.
In Betty Grumble’s Enemies of Grooviness Eat Sh!t, Emma Maye Gibson and drag alter ego Betty Grumble wade into grief, pleasure, and justice with an ecofeminist understanding that the personal and the political are inter-
twined. Nourished by the work of ecosexuals Annie Sprinkle and Beth Stevens, sex clowns and punks, and Grumble’s own lineage within queer performance practice in Gadigal Country (Sydney), Enemies of Grooviness is a “live composting” of the self, but also of patriarchy and other “systems that do not serve us”.
Reckoning with the loss of her best friend, a Palestinian-Lebanese poet, as well as the pain of seeking justice for domestic violence through the unsatisfactory court system, Gibson sees her body as both “witness to carnage” and “a protest site” strengthened by movements of resistance. Enemies of Grooviness emerged as a “simultaneous howl of rage, but also compassionate dissolve,” she says. Joy, terror, and the grotesque have always mingled in Grumble’s world. A pleasure ritual is an essential part of the show. “It’s a big space for the mess and for trouble, and it wants to transform pain into beauty,” Gibson says.
“It’s a big space for the mess and for trouble, and it wants to transform pain into beauty"
Betty Grumble
How we process pain and come to understand it in our bodies is at the centre of Suhui Hee’s live sound and movement piece Ill Behaviour, which features a 45-minute soundscape made from the auscultation (listening to the body’s internal sounds) of
Photo: Joseph Mayers
Betty Grumble
loved ones. Hee traces this fascination back to imagining the sounds in her mother’s womb, a childhood of listening to her father’s stomach, and to the many sound recordings of her friends’ bodies in her possession. “I just thought it was something people did!” she laughs. Rumblings and pulsatings of the body interior are distorted through experimental sound processing, a making-strange that calls for renewed bodily intimacy and attentiveness: excitingly, Hee has been experimenting with doing this live for the Fringe.
“Very o en, we don’t listen to our bodies,” she says. “Listening to your heartbeat, trying to figure out how your body is feeling, feels like a behaviour that only happens when you’re ill.” As someone who was once chronically ill and now experiences episodic illness, Hee understands her body as an archive of medical, pedagogical, and visceral occurrences. Ill Behaviour embraces the uncanny as a way to sit with discomfort as well as explore the idea of monstrosity in the queer (ill) body, transcending the binary between horror and beauty to inhabit both. “What does it sound like to be alive? That’s what I’ve accessed,” Hee says about the performance. “And realising for myself that my body wants to live, for sure. It
wants to be sonorous, wet, animate, present in society, and trying.”
Reconnecting with our bodies is not merely a self-centred, hedonistic act; it can be crucial to accessing a sense of aliveness, of possibility, that is being kept from us by design. Hee hopes Ill Behaviour o ers a new way of entering our own bodies, opening the door to ways of reconceiving care and caregiving. And to Gibson, the joy of awakening in our bodies together is utterly necessary. “[There are] forces that would like us to not be awake to the way things are, [so] that we can’t take our sovereignty back, and also fight for the sovereignty of peoples globally,” she says. Art is not a distraction: “We are not coming to these spaces to forget. It’s a way to help us remember how to be.”
VENUE: Assembly Roxy
TIME: 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 6, 12, 19) , 9.15pm
SHOW Ill Behaviour
VENUE: Summerhall
TIME: 31 Jul-10 Aug (not 4, 7) , 1.40pm
Photo: Natalie Soh
SHOW Betty Grumble’s Enemies of Grooviness Eat Sh!t
Ill Behaviour
The Family Stone
As she prepares to perform her acclaimed Pendulum Trilogy in its entirety for the first time, Mairi Campbell talks through the process involved in bringing the shows together
Words: Lorna Irvine
Critically-acclaimed, award-winning Scottish musician and theatre maker Mairi Campbell makes beguiling art that is at once atavistic and utterly contemporary, weaving together storytelling, visual art and music. At this year’s Fringe, she brings her Pendulum Trilogy, comprised of Pulse (which was first performed 10 years ago), Auld Lang Syne and Living Stone, to the Scottish Storytelling Centre, performing the trio of shows together for the first time. With work steeped in history and her own lived experience, Campbell is excited to be bringing the trilogy together. “It is a thrill to finally present all three shows at the Fringe,” she says. “I’ve been watching performers doing amazing feats of endurance and memory over the years so I know it’s possible! I always knew the three shows were a unit of work, that bring the particularity of my experiences with those of humanity.”
Living Stone, the third show, features a talisman – a mill stone that is 400 years old, found in her home island of Lismore. Campbell says of the stone: “I knew at the start of making Pulse that I needed to make a stone metro-
Photo: Julie Fayngruen
nome, or pendulum, so the audience could see gravity in action, the weight of a stone slowly turning or swaying.
“My brother-in-law found it on my great grandmothers’ cro on the island of Lismore. I saw it leaning up against the wall one day and knew it was the one. My friend Tim Vincent Smith was with me on our quest and he figured out how to make the pendulum: three hazel sticks, an iron hook, some rope and the stone.”
“It is a thrill to finally present all three shows at the Fringe”
Also known as a quern stone, the mill stone was chipped at some point, probably during the 16th century when home mill stones were made illegal. “Everyone had to use the landlord’s mill,” Campbell explains. “There were riots at the time and many quern stones were broken. Mine still has a hole in the middle which is unusual. It’s like a talisman to me. A beautiful, light, loving presence that graces the stage. I feel as though I’m accompanying the stone on stage, rather than the other way round.”
Obviously, there are challenges in bringing about a performance of this magnitude. As
Campbell notes, “I think getting my body and feet back into step dancing mode for Pulse will be a thing to work out. I’m 10 years older and my body’s changed so we’ll have a rethink on the choreography in our rehearsals in July.
“The biggest challenge is to be deeply present in performance,” she continues. “To prepare I need quiet during the day. I go to through the whole script, exercise my body and my voice. I love the quiet daily ritual of preparation for a show.”
As a seasoned Fringe performer, Campbell is always delighted by the receptive Edinburgh Festival audiences and the response she receives to her work. “If the audience reaction is anything like the past then it’ll be a joy,” she says. “I find audiences are moved, they love the humour and the deep journeying that we go on. They can relate to the issues. It’s very Scottish without being hokey.”
“It’s real and you can’t argue with lived experiences, which is what I base them on,” Campbell adds. “The audience also love having the stone there during the performance. It’s grounding and relaxing. The shows can be a welcome break from the frenetic energy of Edinburgh during the Fringe!”
SHOW
Mairi Campbell: Pendulum Trilogy
VENUE: Scottish Storytelling Centre TIME: 2-17 Aug (not 11) , 5pm
Girls to the Front
With shows that centre LGBTQ+ experience, Indra Wilson and Róisín Sheridan-Bryson explain how queer theatre is the future of the Fringe
Words: Alekia Gill
The Fringe has made its name by making names. When television was booming, producers peppered audiences on the lookout for their next star. A performer could be whisked from a low-budget show in a pub basement to a primetime panel with a live studio audience. Those on the fringes really did seem to be pulled into the middle, li ed up the rungs of the ladder and into stardom.
A lot of the time, these emerging stars occupy identities that o en go underrepresented. With accommodation getting pricier and the city getting busier, many have questioned whether this model still stands, or whether the only thing “fringe” about the festival is its name. Does this authentic Fringe still exist, and where can we find it?
“Though it’s my lived experience, this is now all of our story to tell, it’s all of our work”
Indra Wilson
Indra Wilson brings us Float, which isn’t the science fiction space odyssey you might expect, but a raw exploration of how a young person copes with pregnancy loss. Written from Wilson’s personal experience, the show uses the metaphor of a solo space mission to
Photo: Looky Here
Indra Wilson
examine their decision to be a single parent and how they cope when crashing back down to earth.
The show tackles the o -stigmatised issue of pregnancy loss in young people with unwavering strength, aware of its status as a ‘taboo’ topic. Though Wilson admits, “at scratch nights I see shoulders tighten up – people don’t know how the show is going to handle it,” they have moved audiences who “see their own grief stories” within the production.
As a genderqueer person, Wilson states, “We made the decision to give employment for trans identities and non-binary identities. It was our main focus to create a rehearsal space which we had never seen before. Though it’s my lived experience, this is now all of our story to tell, it’s all of our work.”
The organisation Somewhere For Us has looked into the queer population at the Edinburgh Fringe, finding that in previous years just 5% of participants identified as LGBTQ+.
Despite this, writer of Lost Girls / At Bus Stops Róisín Sheridan-Bryson says “everyone I know is gay. I look around and everyone’s gay.” Made up of an almost-entirely queer team, Lost Girls / At Bus Stops is a crushingly enticing love story that palpably lays out all the feelings one has whilst devastatingly in love. The play, set at the Fringe, will soon run at the Fringe in Assembly George Square.
Speaking about her show’s reception, Sheridan-Bryson says, “There’s a particular feeling with some of the reviews that we got, and this isn’t any shade to them, but I think it being reviewed by straight people was a very di erent experience for them. Multiple reviews used the word ‘sweet’, but lesbians were weeping whilst watching it.”
Looking at the history of queer theatre, we notice that lesbians are rarely in the fore – so how do you feel inspired when paving the way? Sheridan-Bryson says she notices little flashes in all sorts of content, be it the romance of Bridget Jones’ Diary or a single scene from sitcom Hacks. “A lot of the experience of being a queer person is searching desperately for that one tiny bit of authentic representation, and you always find it in the most unexpected places. It feels like there’s almost an insatiable thirst for queer representation, and there’s never enough.”
It’s not uncommon to hear people remark that the Fringe isn’t what it used to be, but through Wilson and Sheridan-Bryson’s shows it feels as though industry barriers are being broken down constantly. Entirely queer teams are leading production studios to work in new, fresh ways, spotlighting people who have been in the dark for years.
Float
VENUE: Gilded Balloon Patter House TIME: 30 Jul-25 Aug (not 10, 24) , 6pm
SHOW Lost Girls / At Bus Stops
VENUE: Assembly George Square TIME: 15-24 Aug, 2.20pm
SHOW
Photo: Tommy Ga-Ken Wan
Lost Girls / At Bus Stops
Ad Infnitum Last Rites
Pleasance 1 → Venue No 33
Traverse 1 → Venue No 15
Hackney Showroom with Sutara Gayle AKA
Lorna Gee
The Legends of Them
Myth Busters
At the Fringe and EIF, two productions take on the classical myth of Orpheus and Eurydice, but in two very di erent ways
Words: Gareth K Vile
Orpheus and Eurydice is one of the defining classical Greek myths – its conclusion of frustrated redemption seems to distil the tragedy into an emotive gesture, rediscovered by di erent eras and genres. The Edinburgh International Festival o ers a staging of Gluck’s 1762 opera, with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Scottish Opera and Australia’s Circa combining under the direction of Circa’s Artistic Director and CEO Yaron Lifschitz to o er a circus informed spectacle. Wright&Grainger’s contemporary version, meanwhile, strips the storytelling back to its origins in bardic recitation, featuring a speaker and a musician.
“It is a formative myth for me,” says Lifschitz. “I have worked with it in many forms. It is the story of a double loss, and a story of enduring hope and the transformative power of love. And it is prosaic: it’s about people doing things for someone they love. I am also a great lover of Gluck as a classical composer.”
“Nothing we do is looking backwards but it has those thousands of years behind it”
Yaron Lifschitz
If Lifschitz’ inspiration is rooted in a particular medium and the story’s themes, Alexander Flanagan-Wright laughs when asked about his company’s inspiration. “It’s a silly story really! In 2016, Phil [Grainger] and I had two weeks o and I just booked four or five dates and I asked Phil: do you want to do a version of Orpheus or The Odyssey? He said: ‘never heard of them.’ And I said: ‘let’s do Orpheus, it’s got a singer in it.’ And that was it.”
The flexibility of the myth is evident in the contrast between the two versions: it can carry its depth of meaning whether given an orchestral and circus production or simply told by two men on stage and, for the latter, Orpheus becoming a lonely man singing in a pub.
Wright&Grainger’s updating brings home the timelessness of the Orpheus myth, but also fits their aesthetic. “We have never done anything traditionally theatrical. We’ve played music with each other since we were 14. I made immersive theatre and Phil ran a company that made work for families. Because we grew up in a rural landscape, it has always been much easier to do a show in a local pub. So, we make work that sits where people are gathering,” Flanagan-Wright continues. “It’s me with a book and Phil with a guitar: we deliberately made it so it could happen anywhere.”
Yet for all its immediacy, their Orpheus had endured: “We wrote it in two days and
meant to do four or five shows. But something worked and we have done about 600.”
For Lifschitz, Gluck’s classicism – which sits between the earlier formal ornamentation of the baroque and the full-blown emotionalism of romanticism – articulates the intensity of the myth. “Gluck finds the emotive power of structure and form over ‘the laying it out with a trowel’. It may seem unyielding on the surface but, for me, has a great emotional impact. It is as if you are watching subtle cracks appear in a column.”
Their surface di erences aside, both interpretations recognise the intrinsic dynamism and endurance of the myth, its combination of hope and catastrophe, and its continued resonance.
“These old stories – at some point they were brand new stories that spoke to their communities. Nothing we do is looking backwards but it has those thousands of years behind it,” concludes Flanagan-Wright, while Lifschitz comments that the subject matter is always relevant. “The tragedy has already occurred when they fall in love,” he says. “Love is a catastrophic rupture to the everyday. And there are layers of catastrophe that come together in that final moment.” And whether accompanied by Bruce Springsteen songs at a karaoke or the restraint of Gluck, Orpheus and Eurydice become ancient symbols of the star-crossed lovers.
SHOW Orpheus and Eurydice
VENUE: Edinburgh Playhouse
TIME: 13-16 Aug, various times
SHOW Orpheus
VENUE: Summerhall
TIME: 31 Jul-7 Aug, 9.30pm
Photo: Keith Saunders
Orpheus and Eurydice
All Together Now
Writer/performer Oliver Ayres, Ghent-based company Ontroerend Goed and NYC’s Dutch Kills Theater present shows that blur the boundaries between audience and performer with care and compassion
Words: Sean Greenhorn
The idea of blurring the line between audience and performer is hardly new. From the catharsis of Ancient Greek theatre, which invited emotional identification, to the improvisational spirit of 16th-century Commedia dell’arte, audience engagement has long been central to performance. In the 20th century, experimental theatre pushed this further, dissolving the boundary entirely and handing the act of meaning-making over to the audience.
For the Edinburgh Fringe, interactive theatre and audience participation has o en meant forcing the audience into discomfort; shocking and provoking them for cheap laughs and shocks. However, in recent years, a new kind of interactivity has emerged, one that emphasises care, compassion and connectivity.
This year, three shows are putting the audience at the centre of their performance, empowering them to create truly unique
Thanks For Being Here
Photo: Kurt Van der Elst
experiences around important themes. In I’m Ready to Talk Now, Oliver Ayres brings audience members into their experience of hospitalisation for a solo one-on-one show. Meanwhile, in Thanks For Being Here, Belgian theatre company Ontroerend Goed celebrate the audience through a meticulously cra ed piece that moves away from aggressive confrontation toward gentle reassurance. Dutch Kills Theater’s Whisper Walks tenderly takes inspiration from the Japanese Kaze no Denwa (Wind Phone), exploring how memories can be connected to a place and time.
Each of these shows gently breaks down the barrier between audience and performer. Alexander Devriendt of Ontroerend Goed believes “it should always be an invitation,” while Alley Scott of Whisper Walk says, “I feel very strongly that our audience members are our collaborators.” All of these shows are built as interactive pieces from the ground up, with the audience’s active collaboration a core tenet of their performance. Given that the majority of I’m Ready to Talk Now has the audience tucked into a bed listening to a monologue, it would presumably be possible to perform it in a more traditional set up, but Ayres says that “there was never an alternative…it’s just so much harder to connect when you’ve got the lights in your eyes.”
Emotionally, these shows create a di erent connection with the audience. Whereas traditional theatre may ask the audience to care about the drama unfolding onstage, these performances turn that on its head by showing care for the audience, asking them to embrace vulnerability and making that core to their experience. Given how Ayres opens up for his show, he expects the audience to do the same: “By being vulnerable, I guess they kind of earn this story.” Although these shows are not overtly political, the joy of connectivity and togetherness is a radical act, especially in these polarised times. As Devriendt says, “There are a few people out there who decide the course of the world...but that doesn’t mean we can’t feel connected and trust each other.”
A noticeably contemporary thread across all three shows is their inventive use of technology. Ayres and Dutch Kills rely on pre-recorded audio to build intimacy, while Ontroerend Goed uses video to shi perspective and bend time.
Technology as a space for performance is not new, but here it is not a gimmick or a distancing tool. Instead, it becomes a means of forging connection, making its emotional resonance feel especially powerful for modern audiences.
“There are a few people out there who decide the course of the world but that doesn’t mean we can’t feel connected and trust each other”
Alexander Devriendt
It is striking that each of these performers note how audiences wilfully participate when invited to do so, becoming co-collaborators who define and shape the performance. In both Ayres and Dutch Kills’ shows, audiences pass on their personal stories, whether to Ayres directly or via Whisper Walks’ ‘Whisper Museum’.
In many ways, these performances capture the essential power of theatre, the chance to be part of something entirely unique, shared in real time with other people. No two performances are ever the same, just as no two people and no two lives are exactly alike. These interactive works’ emotional charge comes from acts of care and vulnerability, that feel quietly radical in a world that so o en rewards detachment.
SHOW I’m Ready to Talk Now
VENUE: Meeting Point at Traverse Theatre TIME: 3-24 Aug (not 4, 7, 11, 14, 18, 21) , times vary
SHOW Thanks For Being Here
VENUE: ZOO Southside TIME: 12-24 Aug (not 18) , 1.45pm
SHOW Whisper Walk
VENUE: Meeting Point at Assembly George Square Studios TIME: 2-25 Aug, times vary
Living Memory
Elisabeth Gunawan and Alfrun Rose discuss how their theatre shows interrogate the possibilities and limits of AI technology
Words: Jamie Dunn
Artificial intelligence is all over this year’s Fringe, from a classical concert composed by ChatGPT to an installation where a bot will predict your future. Elisabeth Gunawan’s Stampin’ in the Graveyard and Alfrun Rose’s Dead Air are shows o ering more poignant examinations of this quickly evolving technology by exploring its capacity to let the dead live on. Neither theatremaker used AI in the
making of their show, but both grapple with why, as humanity, we might want to build such a macabre tool.
Stampin’ in the Graveyard began life in 2020 as a concept album performed as a digital theatre piece on a Zoom-like platform. In that earlier incarnation, the audience members watching at home were asked to close their eyes and just listen to the poems
Elisabeth Gunawan in Stampin' In The Graveyard
Photo: Valeriia Poholsha
Photo: Alda Valentína Rós
and music. By using headphones designed for silent disco in this in-person version at Summerhall, Gunawan is hoping to create a similar sensibility. “I wanted to go back to this feeling that we had when everybody was listening in their own living rooms,” she explains. “The intimacy of that but also the feeling of being invited to go into yourself.”
Gunawan will take audiences on a chooseyour-own-adventure-style journey that tells the story of a chatbot who’s trying to make sense of her creators in a post-apocalyptic world. “This piece of AI has been le for so long that she’s learned how to animate the space,” explains Gunawan. “She’s taken over the projection screen and sound, and she’s trying to figure out the meaning of her existence in this new paradigm. To do that, she goes through the human memories that are stored inside her, and through those memories, we encounter past characters.”
Dead Air, meanwhile, is set in the here and now, and concerns a young woman using an AI app to “resurrect” the father she’s recently lost. The idea was inspired when Rose’s own father died, and a younger cousin messaged her to say he’d come to him in a dream. She was furious. “I was like, ‘Why did dad come to you and not to me?’” She also thought that if an afterlife did exist, her father would want nothing to do with it out of principle. “He was such an atheist that even if there was life a er death, he would be too stubborn to come back.”
Rose was curious, though, and went down a rabbit hole online exploring how AI is being used today to bring back people’s loved ones. “I found this one Japanese show about a woman who’d lost her seven-year-old kid,” she recalls, “and they had built this VR experience for her based on videos of the child. It was one of the saddest things I’d ever seen.” When the woman attempted to hug her daughter, all she
found was air. But even more unsettling was the child’s behaviour. “[The mother] said it was lovely seeing her daughter and hearing her voice again, but what was uncomfortable was she wasn’t behaving like her child. She was too docile, too well-behaved.”
That’s the problem with resurrection, as explored in everything from Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein to Stephen King’s Pet Sematary: what comes back isn’t always what you expect. “When you resurrect someone using AI, which version of them are you resurrecting?” asks Rose. “Is it from when they died? Or from earlier when they weren’t ill? Or is it from when they were young? There is no definitive version of a person.”
“When you resurrect someone using AI, which version of them are you resurrecting?” Alfrun Rose
Gunawan has a theory as to why we’re so hell-bent on perfecting AI: “We’ve created these potentially very dangerous machines that are trained on everything humans created, and what we’ve ended up with is machines that incessantly try to talk to us and have a relationship with us, because chatbots are always trying to figure out what you want from them. This to me, makes them the mirror that humans want so badly.”
I suggest to Gunawan that another great mirror to humanity is theatre, of course. “You’re right,” she says. “And maybe that’s what gave me the safety to approach this complex subject of AI, because theatre, at its heart, is so human.”
Rosamund Pike is Jessica in the much-anticipated next play from the team behind Prima Facie, writer Suzie Miller and director Justin Martin.
Mrs. Warren’s Profession
from Sonia Friedman Productions
Imelda Staunton joins forces with her real-life daughter Bessie Carter in Bernard Shaw’s incendiary moral classic, directed by Dominic Cooke.
The Fifth Step
from Neal Street, Playful Productions and National Theatre of Scotland
Jack Lowden is joined by Martin Freeman in the critically acclaimed and subversively funny new play by David Ireland, directed by Finn den Hertog.
Hamlet
a National Theatre production
from 23 Oct from 27 Nov from 22 Jan
Olivier Award-winner Hiran Abeysekera is Hamlet in this fearless, contemporary take on Shakespeare’s famous tragedy, directed by Rob Hastie.
Adapt and Thrive
Award-winning producer-turned-performer Mark Ashmore of Future Artists talks about his return to the Fringe with his new show, Rise of the Solar Punks – a one-hour performative lecture that turns hard climate data into a guerrilla call-to-action
Tell us about Rise of the Solar Punks.
Where and when was this show born?
What can audiences expect?
I had just spent a year travelling around the world with my award-winning Adelaide Fringe show Terms & Conditions, and one day I was doomscrolling the climate apocalypse, as I melted in 45 degree heat in Australia, try ing to see why it was so hot. T urns out, it was a heat dome caused by climate change. I came across a manifesto entitled ‘Solar Punk’ – every thing up until that point had been about climate doom, but the solar punk manifesto talked of adapting, hope and resilience through a nature-first, and a technology and capitalism-second approach. This spiked my interest. It’s the third summer in a row that we have hit heatwaves in the UK and Europe and so, this is the new normal – the show is about how we got here and where, via solar punk, we might go.
What are your main hopes for this year’s Fringe and what do you hope people will take away from seeing your show?
I did a preview of the show in Brighton, and found that Meta wouldn’t serve my ads for the show on either Facebook or Instagram, because it has the phrase climate change in the write up. Already, the climate conversation is being cancelled by big tech and corporate America, and so we are now in a race to get the word out that we must adapt, whilst the billionaires profit. So I am going to share my story – about how I did not have a clue on how to grow any food, and realised I needed to learn new skills beyond Netflix! I’ll be sharing these adventures (as well as gardening tips).
Based on the show, what’s one piece of advice you’d have for people wanting to get more engaged with climate action? Don’t ignore what’s happening all around you – you can’t bury your head in your phone. If your job is being taken by AI, and you’re stuck in a heatwave and your government is not listening to you – check in with yourself and ask: why is this happening? I think my mission is to bring critical thinking back, and Rise of the Solar Punks is part performance, part essay, part seminar about all our futures, via my lived experience so far. Let’s start a conversation – come and see something di erent at the Fringe this summer. Solar punk is about hope, so bring the noise.
For tickets, head to whatson.paradise-green.co.uk and edfringe.com/tickets. Follow @future_artists on Instagram
SHOW Rise of the Solar Punks
VENUE: Paradise in Augustines
TIME: 1 Aug, 6.30pm; 2-9 Aug, 12.45pm
Image: courtesy of Mark Ashmore
Standing in the Way of Control
Hannah Moscovitch, Kylie Westerbeck and theatre company fish in a dress explore consent, complicity and control when it comes to women’s bodies
Words: Eilidh Akilade
How should a woman take to the stage? This question permeates a number of plays at this year’s Fringe, shining a spotlight on women, their bodies, and the powers which seek to bind them.
“Red Like Fruit is about one Gen X woman’s reckoning with her personal history in the wake of the #MeToo movement. Lauren’s thinking through a series of sexual episodes that happened in her teens,” says playwright Hannah Moscovitch. Playing at the Traverse, Red Like Fruit follows Lauren as she reflects on the di erence between trauma and experience, a er asking Luke to narrate her life. In this dual narration, Moscovitch rejects simple answers; consent and complicity are o en not so disparate.
To control and be controlled: Blind Faith Theatre’s I See You Watching likewise unpacks this gendered dynamic. Kylie Westerbeck plays a woman attempting to survive the incessant directions of a male MC, delighting in her distress. For Westerbeck, this is a dynamic she knows too well: “I have found myself in recent years surrendering to men’s expectations of an ideal woman and I’ve simply had enough.” Taking such experiences to an eagerly meta stage, Westerbeck uncovers the weighted realities of womanhood (and its performances) under misogyny. “I See You Watching is a reflection of me and all of the women who were raised to perform under these expectations. Who were taught that their worthiness as a woman is dependent on satisfying the male gaze.”
Photo: Ellis Buckley
“I have found myself in recent years surrendering to men’s expectations of an ideal woman and I’ve simply had enough”
Kylie Westerbeck
Such contemporary expectations have their historical antecedents. In The City For Incurable Women, international theatre company fish in a dress brings us to the Salpêtrière Hospital, an 1880s Parisian women’s psychiatric hospital, in which the patients were forced to perform ‘hysteria’ to the public. “At the Salpêtrière, the ‘Hysterical Woman’ became a public sensation: hair down, back arched, white nightie. Tracing to today, we still love seeing ‘crazy women’, love calling women crazy,” says fish in a dress. Medical misogyny refuses to loosen its grip on history – and hysteria is simply one of its many prized possessions. The company continues: “These performances became infamous –audiences flocked to see women hypnotised, holding extreme poses, screaming over invisible snakes.” Drawing on such performances as inspiration, fish in a dress uncovers how abusive imagery replicates itself both within and outwith art, and considers whether this replication is ever ethical.
But the erasure of women’s experience is likewise all too commonplace. Speaking on Red Like Fruit, Moscovitch says, “I wrote the play [to] speak about what it feels like to be a woman now, in the 2020s, and to un-redact the redacted pieces of my own life.” Spotlighting Lauren’s story, Moscovitch refuses to participate in women and men’s enforced legacy of silence.
Our own participation in misogyny is rightfully questioned in The City for Incurable Women. “The audience is watching. They are looking at a body, witnessing abuse,” says fish in a dress, noting how the play demands our voyeurism while simultaneously critiquing it. “The City for Incurable Women once again puts the ‘Hysterical Woman’ in the spotlight, to challenge:
why do we keep looking at her?” We’re le to question the very concept of consent – and who controls it.
There is, however, hope to be had. In its portrayal of women’s resilience, I See You Watching both a rms and inspires audiences. “It has become a reminder to myself and all the women around me of our undeniable power,” says Westerbeck. “This piece is to encourage us in the midst of our exhaustion to embark on the journey of rebellion.” For I See You Watching – as well as Red Like Fruit and The City for Incurable Women – watching is not simply a passive act; rather, it’s a call to action.
I See You Watching
SHOW Red Like Fruit
VENUE: Traverse Theatre
TIME: 31 Jul-24 Aug (not 4, 11, 18), various times
SHOW I See You Watching
VENUE: Gilded Balloon Patter House
TIME: 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 11, 19), 8.30pm
SHOW The City for Incurable Women
VENUE: Pleasance Courtyard
TIME: 30 Jul-25 Aug (not 12), 1.35pm
Photo: David Cimetta
Play On
Crash Theatre Company, Crow Theatre and Song of the Goat discuss their new interpretations of Shakespeare
Words: Laura Kressly
“S hakespeare gets produced constantly. So if you’re going to stage it now, especially in 2025, you’ve got to be saying something new,” argue Ana Ferreira Manhoso and Courtney McManus, founders of Crash Theatre Company. These new approaches to Shakespeare highlight the plays’ elasticity, facilitate commentary on the here and now, and attract audiences looking for something di erent. Using alternative theatrical forms, styles, and genres enable artists to remix these classic stories in exciting and relevant ways, and audiences around the world can’t seem to get enough.
“Theatrical forms that live outside the mainstream open up Shakespeare in ways that make it more porous, more dangerous, and more alive”
Chris Abraham
Crash Theatre Company’s production, Lady Macbeth Played Wing Defence, is an example from West Australia. The musical’s successful tour indicates that many people are eager for current takes on Shakespeare’s plays. “We
were writing it during the global Barbie wave and while the Australian women’s national football team were absolutely dominating at the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup. Suddenly, conversations about gender, power, and sport weren’t niche, they were happening on the court and the field, in the classroom and in wider society. We wanted to use that energy to spread a strong social message about women in sport,” the pair explain. The end product is a pop musical platforming teenage girls, a group with little stage time in Shakespeare’s canon. Though music features in the original plays, the far more modern genre of musical theatre further rejuvenates Shakespeare’s forms and structures.
Another story from an o -ignored group that uses a more recent theatrical form is the Indigenous production As You Like It: A Radical
Retelling at the International Festival, from the land now known as Canada. Crow Theatre artistic director Chris Abraham illuminates Indigenous playwright Cli Cardinal’s thinking:
“As You Like It presents a parable of escape and re-invention – a movement from a corrupt world to a restorative forest – but in a country built on stolen land like Canada, that story takes on a very di erent charge... In this production, the play became a site of inquiry: a way to confront which stories we centre, whose voices we amplify, and what’s at stake when we gather to listen.”
This focus on storytelling is also evident in Hamlet – Wakefulness, from Polish company Song of the Goat. Yet, instead of drawing on performance styles that could be considered new, Director Grzegorz Bral draws on much older forms: “Our theatre believes that the real essence and origin of theatre is music and singing. Before the actors spoke on stage, they sang and danced. And this is what we are constantly exploring – theatre rooted in music and polyphony songs. Singing is an uncontaminated form of human communication, and therefore we use music to surprise our audience with a di erent way of telling the important and powerful stories.” Ultimately, Song of
As You Like It
Hamlet - Wakefulness
Lady Macbeth Played Wing Defence
Photo: Dahlia Katz
Photo: Dagmara Przeradzka
Photo: K Darius
the Goat’s work is regarded as innovative and experimental because it blends old and new.
Drawing on the ancient in the present also resonates with Abraham because it falls outside of current performance making norms. “Theatrical forms that live outside the mainstream – whether they’re rooted in oral traditions, ceremony, satire, or resistance – open up Shakespeare in ways that make it more porous, more dangerous, and more alive,” he states. Older kinds of performance, when combined with Shakespeare’s plays in a contemporary context, result in something powerful. “Shakespeare’s work is so timeless because it can apply and hold relevance with a simple change of context,” add Manhoso and McManus.
Importantly, and perhaps ultimately, rejecting or challenging mainstream performance
makes accessible work and gives opportunities to those who were traditionally excluded. Manhoso and McManus emphasise, “this isn’t about gatekeeping or tradition. It’s about giving everybody access to theatre so we can all tell our stories through art”.
SHOW Lady Macbeth Played Wing Defence
VENUE: Assembly George Square Studios
TIME: 30 Jul-25 Aug (not 6, 13, 20) , 4.15pm
SHOW Hamlet – Wakefulness
VENUE: Summerhall
TIME: 3-15 Aug (not 12) , 10.50pm
SHOW As You Like It: A Radical Retelling
VENUE: Church Hill Theatre
TIME: 20-23 Aug, 8pm
Photo: Declan Young
Lady Macbeth Played Wing Defence
Tapestry of Traditions
As the Aga Khan Music Programme returns to the EIF, Director Fairouz Nishanova and musician Basel Rajoub reflect on its impact
Words: Zoë White
To Fairouz Nishanova, Director of the Aga Khan Music Programme, music is much more than entertainment, it’s a cultural life-force. “In the East, this is how the history is passed down from one generation to another,” she says, citing the example of Afghanistan where music is outlawed under the Taliban. “This is why it’s so strong, and this is why it is banned, because it brings the communities together, it makes them stronger, and it encourages liberal and free thinking. So it becomes very dangerous for an oppressive regime.”
Founded in 2000 as part of the Aga Khan Development Network, one of the world’s largest private development networks, the Music Programme started in Central Asia, and has since spread to the Middle East, North and West
Africa, and South Asia. Starting as an education programme, the project now also presents music to audiences across the world.
Continuing its long-term partnership with the Edinburgh International Festival, the Aga Khan Music Programme is bringing three concerts to The Hub this August. Nishanova explains that each year’s selection of concerts is carefully curated to fit the theme of the festival and to represent a range of musical traditions.
Saxophonist, percussionist and duclar player Basel Rajoub has been involved since 2009. He reflects on the diversity of sounds he and his fellow musicians have created together: “You can’t hear something like that anywhere [else], you know? So for that, I’m saying it’s crazy, but in a really nice way.”
Feras Charestan
Photo: Ryan Buchanan
Tazeen Qayyum
With 2025’s Festival theme being ‘The Truth We Seek’, Nishanova selected acts that have authentic, meaningful stories to tell. The first event is a performance by Tanzanian singer and composer Yahya Hussein Abdallah and Tunisian-born viola d’amore player Jasser Haj Youssef. “It’s an absolutely unique collaboration, and it’s just as prepared as it is improvised,” says Nishanova.
The second concert involves a live calligraphy, drawn on stage by artist Tazeen Qayyum, with musical accompaniment from Rajoub and qanun player Feras Charestan. “It’s di erent every time it’s performed,” explains Nishanova. “And these artists, they come on stage and they sort of look at the members of the audience and see who needs what, who needs to be consoled, who needs to be laughed with, who needs to be celebrated.”
Rajoub is also performing in the final concert of the series, a collaboration between the Aga Khan Master Musicians and two French musicians, Vincent Peirani and Vincent Ségal. He enthuses about the melting pot of sounds they create together: “You have great culture behind the qanun as an instrument so when [Charestan] plays his solos, his music, his comImage: Courtesy of EIF
“It’s an absolutely unique collaboration and it’s just as prepared as it is improvised”
Fairouz Nishanova
positions, it’s something really rich. At the same time you have legendary pipa player [Wu Man], or, for example, one of the nicest oud players in history [Yurdal Tokcan] who’s also joining the project. Then you have great energy from Vincent Peirani, the accordion player, who’s one of the most unique musicians nowadays when it comes to the way he improvises. Same thing with the cello [from Vincent Ségal]; it’s a fantastic sound.”
In addition to the three concerts, the Music Programme is also involved in community projects during the Festival, including a workshop with young musicians aged 8-18, and a shared meal in Broomhouse. “It’s really, really important for us wherever we work, wherever we go, to also reconnect with, o en, émigré communities that do not get to experience their own music very o en on Western stages,” Nishanova explains.
But whether or not they’re familiar with the musical styles being performed, Nishanova hopes audiences will leave with “a confirmation that we are more alike than di erent” and an understanding “that the di erences of others are not something to be scared of, not something to be afraid of. It’s something that can enrich you and help bring in colours of everyday life.”
SHOW Yahya Hussein Abdallah & Jasser Haj Youssef
VENUE: The Hub
TIME: 19 Aug, 8pm
SHOW Canvas of Sound with Tazeen Qayyum
VENUE: The Hub
TIME: 21 Aug, 8pm
SHOW Master Musicians with Peirani and Ségal
VENUE: The Hub
TIME: 22 Aug, 7pm
Mind Music
The Scottish Chamber Orchestra’s Alison Green talks about performing for people with dementia and their loved ones, and the SCO’s upcoming International Festival concert
Words: Evan Beswick
If you’re reading this, you’ve probably got skin in the game. There are an estimated 90,000 people living with dementia in Scotland – a figure set to increase by nearly 40% over the next 20 years. That’s a lot of carers, family members and friends also living with the impacts of a terrible disease. The search for ways to better support su erers and their carers is fast moving from a decades long search to a desperate scrabble.
“Music really seems to help people,” says Alison Green, second bassoon with the Scottish
Chamber Orchestra. For over a decade, Green has been taking small ensembles into hospitals and care homes across Scotland and playing to older adults, especially those with dementia. It’s a work of exceptional kindness and, it turns out, good old fashioned audience pleasing. “It’s just another string to my bow, you could say!” she laughs.
This work in care settings has been under the banner of ‘ReConnect’ – an apt title given alienation from self and others is so characteristic of memory and emotional disease. “Nothing else seems to get into their brain the way that music does,” Green continues. “It’s surprising. When you play well-known tunes people remember the words. They’re happy to clap along or some are happy to take an instrument, a maraca or whatever.”
And it’s an impact which lingers. Green tells one incredible story following a session in a Glasgow hospital. “I le something so my husband went in the next day. The consultant said: ‘it was amazing. The atmosphere on the ward when I did my round last night was really buoyant’. So he noticed the change in the general mood of the patients and it was because of the music that they had enjoyed earlier on in the day. Stories like that just show that it does seem to help.”
This evolved into a programme of concerts, called the Tea Dance Concerts. I’m speaking to Green shortly a er they (gently) brought the house down in Kirkintilloch. Those concerts
Photo: Courtesy of EIF
ReConnect Tea Dance Concert
– like the dementia-friendly concert which marks a first at this year’s EIF – draw on the experience of those hospital sessions, bringing a relaxed environment, informal seating, and a welcome approach to noise, interruptions and waning interest to the concert stage. The one di erence is the move from informal tunes and improvisation to a set programme. “I say to people, ‘you might not recognise all the music we’re playing but we hope we’ve chosen
“Nothing else seems to get into their brain the way that music does”
Alison Green
it so that it’ll give you a nice feeling’. You see by their smiles that we’re getting to them.”
I ask Laura Baxter, Creative Learning Director at the SCO about what success looks like for the orchestra here. “We hope that our dementia-friendly concerts will raise greater awareness of how to support people to live well with dementia and that the concert itself o ers an inclusive and joyous musical experience to an audience that o en, due to
their dementia, live in a silent world,” she tells me over email.
And what next? “The SCO intends to continue fully integrating our dementia-friendly concerts into our regular programme schedule and take these concerts to other locations across Scotland as part of our summer touring programme.”
I wonder what Green herself has learned from her experiences working with people with dementia? “Patience,” she says. “Sometimes [making a connection] can take longer than you think. Just take your time and just allow them to respond in their own time, which can be not as immediate as talking to other people that don’t have dementia.”
“Oh, and an ability to improvise!” Green laughs. A lifelong classical player, she had to unlearn how to read the notes. “I just thought I couldn’t. But I can, and I’m not afraid of making mistakes. If you make a mistake you just make it work in a di erent way. You just go o in a di erent direction.” Hard to think of a more fitting metaphor for the frustrating unknowableness of dementia, and the extraordinary scope for humanity as we navigate it.
SHOW Dementia Friendly Concert
VENUE: The Queen’s Hall TIME: 19 Aug, 3pm
Photo: Courtesy of EIF
ReConnect Tea Dance Concert
All-Night Trams
Make the most of a packed programme of events in the city with our weekend all-night services
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Main Character Energy
Tomáš Kantor, Kat McGarr and Izzy Kate Ward discuss debuting their alter-ego cabaret characters
Words: Kirstyn Smith
Whether they grew up immersed in the lifestyle, or discovered it as a new hobby during the pandemic, cabaret has wrapped its glittering tendrils around so many debut performers this year.
For Tomáš Kantor, whose Sugar delves into the concept of transactional sexual relationships, their interest was sparked through hanging out with their theatre director dad at work.
“I was this mischievous, flamboyant, besotted kid,” they say. “Frequently dressed up as a fairy, running amok on sets, chasing spotlights, imitating the sultry croons and vampy quips of these burgeoning stars.”
Such a sparkling childhood feels utterly enviable, not least if you can transform your early-years cabaret education into a career. There’s a uniqueness and community that cabaret a ords, making it an obvious choice for performers who have something to say – its ability to shroud any topic in fabulousness is an ideal way of getting a serious point across.
“By making the audience your confidant, you invite them to care deeply about you and what you’re saying,” Kantor continues. “So when covering ground that might feel more taboo, the previously unspeakable or unimaginable becomes personal. You can learn through the messiness and the survival and the camp and the tension and the danger and the sex. It’s very human.”
Kat McGarr’s debut Stardust is a glitter-soaked cabaret meltdown exploring loss, legacy and grief. She’s been performing immersive theatre since the early 2000s, but it
wasn’t until the concept for her show fell from the sky that she began seriously working on it.
“Being a ‘fallen star’ character, she [Star Dust] just fit into the sparkle and grit of cabaret,” she says. But, more than that: “Cabaret is such a powerful tool for performance because it can really land the hard stu by surprise. Grief is chaos, it is utterly heart-breaking and untethering mess-making,
Sugar
Photo: Meagan Harding
J
absurd, profound and transforming…. cabaret can be all those things too.”
In Mr P from HR the titular character welcomes the audience to their new job, but before long it becomes clear that there are dark secrets about the workplace bursting to be revealed.
“Cabaret is a fun and silly way to platform social issues and commentary,” Mr P’s alter ego Izzy Kate Ward says. “You can satirise the most horrific things and leave an audience laughing in joy… and fear.”
This trio of debuts all approach di cult issues – grief, sexuality and misogyny – in di erent ways, but the throughline between them all is an exploration of the myriad ways in which cabaret is such an engrossing storytelling medium. Looking to make work that creates change in an audience in some way, McGarr dresses up a deeply personal topic in a character that can express both her strength and vulnerability.
“By making the audience your confidant, you invite them to care deeply about you and what you’re saying”
Tomáš Kantor
“I o en begin from a very visual place, collecting pictures and images, so the story is definitely in the visual composition of the character or the ‘scene’,” she says. “It’s in the physical comedy, the shapes, the chaos.”
It’s all about the character, too, for Ward, manifesting the true essence of a story by the characters she brings to life on stage.
“I o en feel characters speak for themselves. The first line Mr P says should tell you everything you need to know about him!”
Keeping the audience engaged and surprised is the fun of cabaret for Kantor, focusing on being super clear about the story they’re telling.
“And then, explode that baby open with everything I’ve got – song, dance, musicianship, character, comedy, pathos, a bit of audience interaction. Eyes are a storyteller’s secret weapon, they’re portals, and mine will be big and twinkly for you!”
SHOW Sugar
VENUE: Assembly Checkpoint
TIME: 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 12, 18) , 4.20pm
SHOW STARDUST Starring Star Dust (In Person)
VENUE: Underbelly, Bristo Square
TIME: 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 6, 12, 18) , 5.25pm
SHOW Mr P From HR
VENUE: theSpace @ Surgeons’ Hall
TIME: 18-23 Aug, 10pm
Photo:
Jackson Ducasse
STARDUST Starring Star Dust (In Person)
THE IMMERSIVE NIGHTCLUB MUSICAL WHERE THE NIGHT IS ALWAYS YOUNG
FEATURING SONGS FROM
BEYONCÉ JENNIFER LOPEZ JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE CHRISTINA AGUILERA
BLACK EYED PEAS P!NK KATY PERRY KE$HA COLDPLAY
PANIC! AT THE DISCO CASCADA AVRIL LAVIGNE BRITNEY SPEARS + MORE!
21:15 | 30 JUL - 24 AUG
ASSEMBLY CHECKPOINT
BOOK BY JACK HOLDEN
CONCEIVED AND DIRECTED BY STEVEN KUNIS CHOREOGRAPHED
EICC AND THE PLEASANCE
4th – 8th August 2025
Be part of the audience of some of the best loved BBC radio shows and podcasts.
Enjoy ome of he fine ac pe fo ming a he Edinb gh Festivals as they join presenters for fun, entertainment and chat.
For FREE tickets and information
Please scan the QR code or go to pleasance.co.uk EICC, 150 Morrison
Sound Systems
Lomond Campbell, K Mak and Wet Hands discuss the audio-visual projects they’re bringing to the Fringe
Words: David Pollock
The intersection of music and technology is a hotter topic than usual this year, with the proliferation of AI. At the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, meanwhile, some shows and events are re-examining this relationship in their own way, with human-generated explorations of how music and technology can interact in an audiovisual environment.
“MŮO is part performance and part installation, and is centred around a music machine I’ve built called the Muonophone,” says Highlands-based music producer Lomond Campbell, no stranger to such experiments when he was in the band FOUND. “It uses muon detectors to detect harmless radiation created by cosmic rays hurtling through deep space, then converts these cosmic rays into evolving music and visuals.”
Presented in collaboration with Sonica Glasgow and the French Institute, with technological support from the University of Glasgow, the French Institute will host ten performances and an ongoing installation throughout the month.
whether that be energy from a sun, black holes, stars exploding, planets colliding or possibly even other nuclear civilisations annihilating each other. So I’m inviting people to think about that, but there’s no shame at all in just coming along to appreciate the design of the machine and get lost in sound.”
K Mak is Kathryn McKee, a classically-trained cellist from Brisbane, Australia, who has played with big names including Eminem and Kanye West, as well as performing orchestral, chamber and opera sessions. Her performance is named K Mak at the Planetarium, taking over the Demonstration Room at Summerhall to create a planetarium-like audio-visual environment, in consultation with experts from her own local planetarium.
“It’s an explosion of colour and sound, an opportunity to go wherever the music takes you”
K Mak
“MŮO is about making nuclear forces that surround us both visible and audible,” says Campbell. “The bigger concept is to stop and contemplate the journey of each muon. Every sound you hear is the result of an unimaginably massive nuclear event in deep space,
“It’s an explosion of colour and sound, an opportunity to go wherever the music takes you,” says K Mak. “It couples tailored visuals with original live music in a unique, intimate setting, an abstract expression of my own joy and an invitation for others to access theirs. I love the idea of transporting people with music and colour, and I guess it fits with the times in that we appreciate the extra stimulation of visuals with our music. The combination of hundred-year-old instruments with modern audio and visual technology is also appealing.”
Finally, Channel is a deep-listening experience produced by Dutch Kills Theater Company and created by New York-based musician, composer, and sound designer Jack McGuire, aka Wet Hands. “The audience are invited to use their voice to help shape and create the meditative space together,” he explains. “I’ll improvise a live score of ambient electronic music informed by the audience’s collective sound, creating a space to discover the ways your own personal sounds interact with the collective sound. This piece is about the act of listening with intention, truly listening and being heard as a way to connect to ourselves and to others.
“‘Deep listening’ has been something I’ve been interested in for many years, a er being introduced to the work of Pauline Oliveros,” he continues. “She came up with the term and created a number of works that challenge audiences to participate in creating sonic meditations. Her work asks us how many sounds we tune out each day and reminds us that the more intentional we can be in listening, the more we open ourselves up to really hearing each other. I want people to find a sense of calm and presence in the hectic environment of the Edinburgh Fringe, to walk away thinking about how they listen to all the sounds of their daily lives, and how doing so with more intention will create more presence and connection.”
SHOW K Mak at the Planetarium
VENUE: Summerhall
TIME: 31 July-24 Aug (not 11, 18) , various times
SHOW M Ů O Live
VENUE: French Institute
TIME: Various dates, 6pm
SHOW M Ů O
VENUE: French Institute
TIME: 8-25 Aug (not 11)
SHOW Channel
VENUE: Assembly Roxy
TIME: 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 12) , 2.40pm
Channel
K Mak at the Planetarium
MŮO
Photo: Alley Scott
Photo: Peter Frankland
Photo: Lomond Campbell
North West End
Last Night a Dance Show Saved My Life
Nick Nikolaou and Tommy Small explain the importance of placing queer joy at the heart of their Fringe shows
Words: Jack Howse
The Edinburgh Fringe is known for its huge array of venues and stages – toilets, arches, biscuit factories, any corner of any street. It’s a festival that celebrates how anywhere can be transformed into a little slice of magic. In
much the same way, queer nightlife has long been about adaptation and survival – turning unlikely places into sanctuaries. As queer spaces close at an alarming rate, queer parties are finding new life in DIY and local venues.
Photo: Robbie Mullins
Anatomy of a Night
“Queer people – nothing stops them… they’ll make the party wherever,” says Nick Nikolaou, creator and performer of Anatomy of a Night, a dance show that explores the memories of any queer night out.
Aptly, the show will be performed in the old veterinary surgeon halls of Summerhall, a venue that could double as a site for an illegal queer rave back in the day. Down the road in the old community centre of ZOO Southside, Tommy Small’s dance show Small Town Boys also explores memories and intersections of queer nightlife and community at the height of the AIDS epidemic. “It’s about celebrating queer joy and recognising our history,” Small says. Taking its name from the 80s queer Scottish classic, Small Town Boys transports the audience back to the imagined 80s queer club of Paradise, a kaleidoscope of nightlife memories.
culture and the tragedy of the AIDS crisis – was vital. Small Town Boys employs a community cast to invoke their own memories through movement. “Some people have very little dance background, but they want to feel part of something,” he says. In both Anatomy of a Night and Small Town Boys, the audience is invited (but not forced) to express themselves through their own bodies, in a process of collective, embodied queer remembering.
“Nothing will stop the queers from getting together and just dancing and having fun”
Nick Nikolaou
It would be easy to assume that shows dealing with AIDS, addiction, queerphobia, and the closure of beloved spaces might lean into sorrow. But both productions instead o er defiant euphoria – a queer joy forged in community, rhythm, and resistance. Nikolaou explains that this was intentional, especially in a time when there are so many terrifying realities facing queer people: “I want people to say, ‘this is so fun and so beautiful’ –and then connect the sadness to it later.”
Small agrees, adding that queer nightlife has always been a space to disconnect from the sadness of the outside world. “It feels like a safe space – that essence of community, of family, of belonging… Every story is not sad and depressing about our community – actually there’s joy too.”
Memory is important to Nikolaou in Anatomy of a Night too. The show is an amalgamation of all the queer nights we’ve had, taking us through all the stages of what happens (like that video of Charli XCX walking listeners through ‘365’). While the show is a heady mix of runway, lip sync, and audience participation –all tenets of the perfect queer night out – for Nikolaou, dance is the core of the show, rooted in memory. “To unlock this club state, you need memory – and movement brings that memory to life,” they say.
For Small, having queer bodies convey their own histories – the euphoria of club
Shows like Anatomy of a Night and Small Town Boys remind us that queer joy and memory don’t just survive – they move, they sweat, they shimmer. There will always be a party, just around the corner – or, as Nikolaou says, “Nothing will stop the queers from getting together and just dancing and having fun.”
SHOW Anatomy of a Night
VENUE: Summerhall
TIME: 13-25 Aug (not 19) , 10.30pm
SHOW Small Town Boys
VENUE: ZOO Southside
TIME: 1-17 Aug (not 4, 11) , 7.15pm
Photo: Maria Falconer
Small Town Boys
Everyday Magic
Circus for children needn’t be “glorified childcare”.
Fest speaks to two artistically interesting shows aimed at kids but that can be enjoyed by anyone
Words: George Sully
Vee Smith and Sadiq Ali, two Edinburgh locals, are bringing their kid-friendly circus show The Unlikely Friendship of Feather Boy and Tentacle Girl to the Fringe this year, supported by the Made in Scotland showcase. It’s a beautiful duet themed around transformation – finding and celebrating our “inner monsters”. And for them, the show wasn’t even meant for children initially.
“We just wanted to make something true to our style – a quality piece of work – that was for children, but ultimately, is just a really good show,” says Smith. When they performed the show for local primary schools, they were impressed by the kids’ emotional literacy. “They definitely emotionally understood
the themes of the show. They just don’t have the adult vocabulary to explain it, like dramaturgically or theatrically, but they get it.”
Meanwhile, from across the Atlantic, São Paulo-based circus company Parlapatões (‘Chatterboxes’) – as part of a broader Brazilian showcase – are staging The Mequetrefo. Hugo Possolo, a founding member of the troupe, and Camila Turim, the show’s producer, echo Smith and Ali’s sentiments:
“We can live our entire life in a day”
Camila Turim
“The most important thing is to respect a child,” says Turim. “They are intelligent, and they are learning from everything, without prejudice.”
The show – heavily inspired by Edward Lear’s nonsense poetry – has already been staged for over 10 years, and all over South America, everywhere from dense urban centres to remote Amazonian communities. So it not only transcends ages, but also “speaks to di erent levels of cultural backgrounds”.
Both of these shows are, perhaps tellingly, non-verbal productions, relying on a physical vocabulary to enact their stories and themes. The Mequetrefo takes us through a single day, with four clowns (named, appropriately, ‘Dias’) discovering the beauty and comedy in everyday things. Unlikely Friendship…, on the other hand, is a personal piece that is as much about transformation as it is about the styles and backgrounds of its creators.
“The two characters’ transformations
The Unlikely Friendship of Feather Boy and Tentacle Girl
Photo: Tommy Ga-Ken Wan
essentially embody, on Vee’s side, a kelpie, which is a mythological Scottish creature,” Ali explains, “and I embody a phoenix, which has roots in my Arabic culture and Egyptian side.”
Smith and Ali find that this contrast is where the magic happens (“drama is all about conflict,” says Smith). Ali was drawn to a phoenix because “it’s a creature of fire and speed and flight and community,” comparing it to Smith’s kelpie character who is “a creature of quiet and slow and depth,” resulting in “two completely di erent elements that shouldn’t be able to exist together.”
Such “wordless visual magic” (Smith) is apparent in The Mequetrefo, too. There the magic “comes from something really simple, like a can, becoming other things,” says Turim. “[The Dias] work with two ladders and two cans. And those objects, they are transformed into every mode of transport: a bus, a car, a boat, a train. And at the end they go to space.”
Turim and Possolo explain that “kids can understand why adults work so much and play so little, but also think about everyday things that we do on our journey through the day.” They say that it is a particularly Brazilian thing to “have to, by necessity, do a lot with very few things.
“That’s why [the clowns] are called ‘Days’ [Dias],” Turim continues, “because it’s about a day in a life. And we can live our entire life in a day.” With Unlikely Friendship…, Ali and Smith are similarly entranced with finding this magic. “All of folklore is about transformation,” says Smith, “and circus, at its heart, makes all the rules of physical space liminal and liquid. Because you’re transcending all of the physical laws that most people need to abide by. You’re able to walk up a vertical landscape, you’re able to transcend gravity.”
Or, in Ali’s words, “creating the extraordinary with two ordinary human bodies.” Because isn’t that what circus – or any artistic discipline – is all about?
SHOW The Unlikely Friendship of Feather Boy and Tentacle Girl
VENUE: Assembly Roxy
TIME: 4-17 Aug (not 6, 13) , 11.25am
SHOW The Mequetrefo
VENUE: Underbelly, Bristo Square
TIME: 30 Jul-10 Aug, 11.20am
Photo: Luiz
Doro
The Mequetrefo
Edinburgh Dining
Photo: William Hearle
Wings
21 Old Fishmarket Close
Two remarkable things moved to Edinburgh in 2013 – Wings, and a little lady who loves food! (Me!) I had a Californian boyfriend who used to take me there and shout, “This is as good as food in California!” and “I miss California!” and “I don’t love you anymore!”
Paradise Palms
41 Lothian Street
NOTHING wrong with having dinner in a nightclub. I once ate a delicious vegan hotdog whilst watching a drag king make out with a mop – if that isn’t the finest of dining, then I’m fine not dining!
Che
21 Forrest Road
Go at 9pm. Ask for cheesy chips with salt & vinegar, chilli sauce, and garlic mayo. Then go to Sainsbury’s on Quarter Mile, buy Rennie Antacids (peppermint), crumble on top. Find me and thank me.
My friend Niall Moorjani’s flat
They make the most delicious chicken curry, inspired by their Dadima’s recipe, which she refuses to teach them. Tbh, Niall could stick their fist in my mouth and it’d be 100x better than anything I could cook.
Mosque Kitchen
50 Potterrow
The best worst-kept secret of the Edinburgh Fringe. If you want to exhausted-comedian-spot, poppadom in hand, this is your space. Delicious, authentic and a ordable Indian and Middle Eastern cuisine.
Jet Petrol Station
Barclay Place
Home to the perfect meal deal created by fellow comedian Jonathan Oldfield and me: 2am, 2017. One Peperami, two Babybels, salt & vinegar Discos, and a blue Powerade.
Harajuku Kitchen
10 Gillespie Place
Delicious, well-priced Japanese food. In Tollcross. I’m running for mayor of Tollcross.
Sora Diana 19-21 Causewayside
Vegan Italian restaurant formerly in (surprise!) Tollcross. Tiramisu is my favourite food group, their vegan one is stunning.
SHOW Lorna Rose Treen: 24 Hour Diner People
VENUE: Pleasance Courtyard
TIME: 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 12) , 6.20pm
Photo: William Hearle
Guide to Drinking in Edinburgh
The So You Think You're Funny? 2024 winner gives us the lowdown on her favourite watering holes in the city
Alana Jackson’s
Image: courtesy of Gilded Balloon
Alana Jackson
It’s August. It’s Edinburgh. You find yourself watching a musical production of Hamlet at 10am, squeezing past tourists on a bustling Royal Mile, the penetrating sound of bagpipes playing in the distance (I’m Scottish – I can say that). It’s overwhelming, you NEED a pint to take the edge o . But where? Well, despite being Glaswegian, I’m somewhat of a drinking connoisseur and can sni out a good pub anywhere. I did some research for this piece by daytripping to Edinburgh on a tax-deductible pub crawl to find my favourite spots… it was hard work, but someone’s got to do it.
Step #1 – Get on a train to Glasgow.
Only joking (obvs!). Despite the deep-rooted rivalry between Glasgow and Edinburgh on which city has better craic, I’m willing to admit some of my favourite nights out ever have been in Edinburgh… As far as I can remember.
My first pub rec is Paradise Palms: Good cocktails, good vibes and right in the heart of the Fringe, so ideal for squeezing in an Aperol Spritz (or three) between shows.
Another great spot is Dragonfly in the Grassmarket, Edinburgh’s oldest cocktail bar but with a modern feel. They have a section of the wine menu called ‘Weird + Wonderful’ which sums up pretty much every day at the Fringe.
Then, escape Fringe madness for a while at Newbarns Taproom in Leith, who make Gilded Balloon’s o cial 40th birthday beer, which I’ve been promised endless pints of (post-show, obviously).
Once you’ve had a couple and you’re feeling ready to laugh at someone else’s misfortune, head over to Appleton Tower to see my show Last Orders which is on at 5pm every day. It’s about drinking and working in pubs and I guarantee I’ll make you feel better about even your worst hangovers and nights out.
SHOW Alana Jackson: Last Orders
VENUE: Gilded Balloon at Appleton Tower
TIME: 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 11) , 5pm
Photo: Alex Renfrew
Photo: @hannahkdove
Photo: James Porteous
Dragonfly
Fruit Salad at Paradise Palms
Newbarns Taproom
THE BETS ARE LAID, WE’RE UNDER STARTER’S ORDERS... AND WE’RE OFF!
One-Man show starring Actor Andy Linden (The Business, Harry Potter, Count Arthur Strong, Silo). An old-fashioned horseracing tipster pits himself against the frepower of The Bookies, with their computer stats, fashy websites and online gambling. But let’s face it, no one ever beats the Bookies. Do they?
Photographer:
Guide to Edinburgh's Music Nicola Meighan’s
The BBC broadcaster and A Kick Up The Arts host takes us around Edinburgh via its music
I should probably start with actual buildings somewhere in our earthly universe, but before we get to those, here’s a nod to a couple of ghost haunts that blazed a trail for where we are…
In the mid-1990s, while Britpop blokes were in full swagger, Garbage released their debut album (fronted by Edinburgh’s Shirley Manson), and a femme-powered DIY uprising shook up the city – and the country for that matter – in no small part thanks to a snakebite-addled venue called the Cas Rock, a festival called Planet Pop, and bands like Lungleg, Gilded Lil, Pink Kross and the Delgados, who also launched the Chemikal Underground label (Mogwai, Arab Strap).
The band’s Emma Pollock reflects on that time at Edinburgh International Book Festival’s 1995: Grrrls Aloud, which also features writers Chitra Ramaswamy and Carrie Marshall, theatre livewire Cora Bissett (who also toured with Blur and Radiohead), and live music from Cariss Crosbie of LGBTQ+ collective Hen Hoose. The Cas Rock is a Sainsbury’s these days, incidentally. If you’ve ever seen a woman crying over the Meal Deals, bewailing time’s relentless march – well, spoiler alert: it was probably me.
Back in the (un)real world of 2025, the city’s airwaves and record crates are galvanised by countless thrilling, eclectic shows on community radio station EHFM, and labels like Athens
Image:
courtesy of artist
Nicola Meighan
of the North, which trades in rare soul, vintage disco and visionary far-flung vibes.
Which leads us on to record shopping, so fire up your wallet and let’s go… Vox Box in Stockbridge is a haven of new and second-hand gems – plus they have intimate live events, glorious sta , and a joy of a section called CONFIDENT MEN. Closer to Waverley Station, you’ll get a warm welcome at music emporium Underground Solution, while record café Slow Progress is perfect for a seat and a refuel. Assai Records wins on the location front – what with being framed by Edinburgh Castle – and if you fancy a time-travelling global voyage, Umbrella Vinyl and Greenhouse Records will be right up your street. Their neighbouring Thorne is a beacon in every sense.
You might fancy some live music or clubbing a er that, and you’re spoiled for choice, from the picturesque Queen’s Hall (their AMPLIFI ‘Sounds of Modern Scotland’ nights are a highlight), to Sneaky Pete’s, the Voodoo Rooms, the Liquid Room and the Caves – not to mention the Wee Red Bar, which isn’t so far from where the Cas Rock used to be. And it’s better than Sainsbury’s. So for old time’s sake, I’ll see you there, and mine’s a snakebite. Some things never change.
Nicola Meighan presents Friday A ernoons on BBC Radio Scotland, and A Kick Up The Arts: A Scottish Arts & Culture Podcast.
SHOW 1995: Grrrls Aloud
VENUE: Edinburgh International Book Festival, Spiegeltent
TIME: 10 Aug, 9pm
SHOW A Kick Up The Arts with Nicola Meighan
VENUE: The Stand
TIME: 18-24 Aug (not 22), 2pm
Image: courtesy of Queens' Hall
Photo: Neil McLean
Queen of Harps at AMPLIFI, Queens' Hall
Umbrella Vinyl
Underground Solution
The Cycling Man’s
Guide to Cycling in Edinburgh
Kathy Maniura’s deeply flawed, lycra-clad Cycling Man takes us around Edinburgh on a bike
It’s time for the Tour de Edinburgh, boys (approx 20 mins)!! Up at the crack of dawn, I strap into my lycra (skin-tight to maximise o ensive bulges) and set o from my lodgings – quite frankly the only passable place to stay in the city: Morningside. Safe to say it’s the Islington of Edinburgh – artisanal bakeries, generational wealth invested in historic housing stock, overpriced little co ee shops-cumhand thrown pottery showrooms. It’s imperative to begin your cycle with an expensive little co ee. I like my co ee like I like my women – the flatter and whiter the better.
Then, I clip in my clippy little shoes and race through the Bruntsfield Links. I see how many games of golf I can viciously interrupt at high velocity. Golf shouldn’t be played on public land, it’s an outrage. Golf belongs on gated, private land where my friends and I can convince ourselves we’re important. That’s why I’ve started a campaign to Keep Golf Private! Text WHERESMYBUGGY to 6969 for a free pin badge.
Then, with only a smattering of bruises from the golf balls and clubs if I’m lucky, it’s up towards Edinburgh Castle. Oh to soak in the glorious history. I take a break to think about when men were men, jousting, eating a quail stu ed in a pigeon stu ed in a turkey stu ed in a goat, burning women as witches who made them uncomfortable. Those were the good old days.
I remount my noble steed (bike) and freewheel down the Royal Mile. It’s like a glorious game of bowling, where I’m the big ball and the pins are arty, speccy little wankers. Five points for an actor flying in period costume, 10 for a mime, 30 if you take out a full Russell Group University improv troupe.
I round o my cycle by stopping outside Holyrood and seeing if I can find a Scottish nationalist to pick a fight with. Because Scotland can’t just leave the union, not out of nowhere, for no good reason, it simply wouldn’t make any logical sense. We had an agreement!! We signed a legally binding document!!! I howl this at some passing tourists and then, completely unrelated, find the nearest pub and sink about 10 pints and call my wife (newly ex-wife). She doesn’t pick up.
SHOW Kathy Maniura: The Cycling Man
VENUE: Pleasance Courtyard
TIME: 30 Jul-24 Aug (not 11, 18) , 4.35pm
The Cycling Man
A Day at the Fringe with Miriam Margolyes
As she returns to Edinburgh with more Dickens and more characters, the iconic actress and author takes us through a typical day at the Fringe
Istart the day usually with porridge or scrambled eggs made for me by my assistant Chad who I met when I was in New Zealand working on a documentary, when he assisted me. He’s very sympathetic and sensible so I invited him to work with me in the UK, so we are
now saddled with each other for the duration of the Fringe! He gets very pissed o with me but is also very patient, kind and helpful. It’s like a trial marriage! I am currently teaching him how to make smoked salmon and cream cheese to give to my guests a er the show!
During the rest of the day I prefer to see as few people as possible… I stay at home, sit in the garden, rest in the a ernoon and go through my lines and maybe watch a bit of tennis on TV. I shut down at my age! I used to be up at 9am and go to the Traverse but now I must curtail my desire to go to the theatre as now I am older, I can’t do that otherwise my performance will lack sparkle.
I trundle up to the venue 15 mins before the show to get ready and I always meet the deaf signers who I have at all my shows. I have a drink of water, a pee and then I am ready. My bladder is notoriously weak but so far, no whoopsies during the show! The show is 50% Dickens and 50% me and I always get really nervous and have a sick bucket ready at the side of the stage. I want to get good reviews, but I am past the day of sucking o anyone to get them, so I just have to deliver a good show! A er the show I love to go and watch other shows but only a erwards – I have to be super disciplined.
