ED FRINGE 2018 FULL REPORT
As a freelancer historically August was the month I worked myself silly and as a result have never had the opportunity to get to the Fringe in Edinburgh. This year I was able to get up for 3 days and pop that cherry and I've returned infatuated, like a teenage girl after the 'first time'. The energy and atmosphere across the city is palpable and infectious.
I could have gone in and overloaded myself but as I was visiting with family I took in an average of 4 shows a day to allow for some time to explore the city further. I feel like this was the right approach respectively as anything less I'd have left feeling I hadn't got the full value of the experience and anything more would have gotten complex and stressful to negotiate.
Wednesday 8th began with a trip in trepidation to
Assassins. Having read advice here to approach college productions with caution it was the right move to start off with this, considering it a support act. In the last 12 months I've really developed an interest in Sondheim's work so attended more out of intrigue. It was ok but not great. The cast delivered the material with the SHOUTING IS ACTING approach and some persistently out of tune brass made for a rather fatiguing experience, but as an introduction to the piece it sufficed. I'd definitely visit a professional production of this, I could imagine it at Hope Mill MCR at some point.
After an absolute sugar overload via doughnuts at Consideit, came
Orpheus at Summerhall. Since a friend started promoting spoken word/poetry gigs in my home town last year an interest in this art-form has grown and so this appealed to me, when a second friend recommended Orpheus specifically I knew I had to book it and boy was I glad I did. Such a wonderful piece. 2 guys and 1 acoustic guitar tell the Greek tragedy of Orpheus in a modern setting that really helps you connect to the journey. As a warning this does come with a tiny bit of audience participation - which I normally dislike and avoid - but found myself joining in and even enjoying when the whole audience got involved singing in cannon and harmony. I really recommend this sheerly for the ultimate high experienced as I left. Soul warming stuff.
A stroll back towards town next took me to
Buried - A New Musical. Keen to take in a even division of new and established material, this new musical telling the story of two people with murderous intention falling in love immediately appealed to me because of its suggested dark nature. After a series of highly amusing failed dates Rose meets Harry and they develop a unique relationship based on a common interest of killing. This musical powers through its 75 minute duration with some beautiful music and some hilarious scenes delivered by a very hardworking cast which the sold-out audience lapped up delightedly. The twist of the story at the end, which I saw coming around 3/4's of the way in, wrapped things up in a way comparable to an episode of Psychoville or Inside No 9. Absolutely loved this and would love to visit it again somewhere in the future.
To complete today's sandwich I required another piece of soggy bread.
Bare was this Tesco Value slice. Whilst the cast did what they could with this, my real issue with this lies with the flawed material. It's a melodramatic mess obviously written someone with unresolved issues regarding their experience of coming out. It's unsympathetic and a very generalized assumption of what coming out involves that I found very difficult to connect with. One of the biggest problems with this piece was that at least one person was on stage crying for a solid 2/3rds of the show in a vain attempt to provoke emotion. By the time the dramatic climax of the story occurred all emotion had been rinsed out and I had absolutely no interest or regard to any character. When someone delivered the line "every gay has a diva trapped inside" I threw my cards in. What utter dross.
Thursday 9th began with a visit to
Alabama God Damn. Anyone familiar with the S-Town podcast will recognize the characters and story of this piece of physical theatre. When I was listening to the podcast series for the second time I found myself visualizing a stage mounted production of the story so I had to book this to see how someone had realized the same idea. I obviously had a preconception of what I expected from the piece based on the ideas in my head. As a stand-alone piece this works nicely, but if your familiar with the characters and story it works 10 times better. All of the characters have had name changes and there's a slight derision of the original narrative but the inclusion of some unique hill-billy banjo blues sets it off. Parts of it suffered from a lack of rehearsal and the narrating character (Brian Reed) was the weakest link fumbling through the majority of it but a fun way to start the day.
Next up was a non-fringe visit to Tom Kitchin's Michelin starred 'The Kitchin' in Leith for lunch and highly recommended it is. Coley & Squid risotto. Nom.
Back on to the Fringe Binge with
Electrolyte another piece booked because of the categorization 'Theatre (music, spoken word)', three categories that appeal to me. I was slightly dubious about this as normally I dislike real-world/real-life 'pedestrian' stories. I like surrealism, fantasy, escapism so based on its description "Jessie's sick of Leeds. A city she thought she would never leave." I wasn't expecting to like this. I do love electronic music though and the live electronic soundtrack grabbed me straight at the start, closely followed by the delivery of Jessie's spoken word beat poetry. A tale began with so many resonances that I could connect to and identify with that I was engaged entirely. This had the entire audience captive from start to its climatic and emotional conclusion. I'm a fairly strong person and theatre doesn't make me cry. I don't know what happened here but this broke me. I almost cannot put into words how genuinely amazing this experience was. Part poetry, part rave, part gig, part roller-coaster, all theatre. In some ways this is like the best album by The Streets that never happened. Such utter conviction and mesmerizing dedication to the characters from all the cast. I really hope there's another life for this post-Fringe. I tried to thank some of the cast afterwards, broke down (this never happens) and had to walk away. I genuinely had to go stand in a dark, quiet corner afterwards for 10 minutes to compose myself and I wasn't the only one. I noticed so many people left affected in a similar way but I've never had an experience like this before. I can not recommend this enough!
In recuperating from the emotional onslaught the missed calls and messages from my Dad had gone unnoticed who was trying to inform me that we'd arranged to meet at the wrong venue for the next act, due to start in 5 minutes time! MAD PANIC and a sprint across Edinburgh from Pleasance Dome to Pleasance Courtyard for
Mark Watson's 'The infinite Show'. Possibly this was the universe's way of helping pull me back into reality as the show was 10 minutes late starting due to an earlier fire alarm, but I made it with moments to spare. I guess you could consider this the 'Headline' act. The only really famous name/brand for me to book in, wouldn't normally have booked to see Watson, my Dad chose this, but I'm glad we went. A great hour of fresh material fueled by suggestion cards completed by the queuing audience prior to the show. He could easily have gone on for another hour, I think he wanted to too and I'd have stayed.
Continuing the comedy theme - because ultimately that's what the Fringe is about, isn't it? - was
Stiffs in a converted conference room at a Hilton hotel. Billed as 'absurdist comedy' this play ticked all the boxes. Two guys wake up in a morgue with no recollection of who they are or how they ended up there. Stellar fun and effectively delivered. There was an essence of Frank Spencer in one of the characters - by no means a bad thing - and for the second time in as many days this piece could easily have been written by Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton, fitting nicely into the Inside Number 9 style complete with an hilarious twist.
En Route to
Sweeney Todd, I decided in my wisdom to grab a bite to eat. I passed a pie shop and thought nothing would be more fitting prior to this viewing than a nice meat pie. Bad mistake, it was quite terrible and seemingly a precursor to the imminent abomination. Rather than play the piece verbatum some creative expression was applied, as the director justified in his programme notes, the Londoners translated into haunted souls transferred from Dantes Inferno. An interesting idea, but poorly executed, it felt like a bunch of extras from The Rocky Horror Show had landed in the wrong show. Like Assassins, this piece fell victim to SHOUTING IS ACTING and even more flat brass. I was prepared to give this relatively young cast the benefit of the doubt and an omission in this review until they pulled out the slo motion bullet sequence from Hamilton - which I supposed you could say Hamilton borrowed from The Matrix - but it just felt plagiarized and ineffective attempt to provide depth.
Tired and perturbed from 3 poor musical productions out of 4 I cancelled my Friday morning plans to see
Dirty Rotten Scoundrels for fear of a fourth similar experience. I'm glad I did though as it gave us chance to return to the Royal Mile. On the first day I was flyer-ed repeatedly by a very enthusiastic bunch of kids and parents for a concert by
Barnsley Youth Choir. Preconceptions told me to avoid this, kids from Barnsley singing pop songs sounds like a disaster waiting to happen and not to my taste at all but their enthusiasm was contagious and intrigue got the better of me as they told me they'd be doing a free concert on the Mercat Stage in 10 minutes time. I strolled along and expecting to respond with polite applause I was quickly proven wrong. Boy can this group sing and not just that, their harmonies and arrangements were so good. A credit to their Musical Director. Back on the Royal Mile Friday morning these kids were back out with more flyers, promoting another free concert. I was able to take my parents along this time to see these as they performed some different material to their first concert two days prior and again they bowled me over. If your about on the Royal Mile they seem to be performing 11:15am every day on the Mercat Stage. I don't know if they're there all month or just one week, but really, please go support them. They're great!!
With some extra time gained through the loss of Scoundrels I used the Fringe app to find a last minute show in close proximity to the Royal Mile. Standup? For a fiver? "Wouldn't it be good to find a bit of meaning in your otherwise pointless existence?" in the description. Bit of a gamble but I'm sold. I wandered down into the Monkey Barrel basement bar to buy a ticket and by the time I got outside a huge queue had formed for
Jen Brister's - Meaningless - This could be alright then I thought to myself. Billed at 55 minutes but coming in closer to 70 Jen pulls apart attitudes and opinions of everyone gathered so far on her 4 year journey through parenthood with her wife. Despite a few stumbles in the delivery of a couple of lines, this was a great find. My real only bug bear being the '£5 ticket or pay what you want' approach. I wouldn't have minded but the 'pay what you want' bit is done at the end as you leave. So despite buying a ticket prior to the show, I was made to feel incredibly guilty for not throwing coins into the large metal bucket Jen proudly brandished at the exit.
The fifteen minute overrun of Meaningless made for the second manic sprint across Edinburgh, this time made all the more stressful as I had gambled on not buying a ticket prior to the show. With seconds to spare I made it up and into the Assembly Hall for
Legacy: A Book of Names but because of my frivolity I ended up sat the back. For some reason the the sound designer on this had chosen to amplify the show via ambient rifle mics rather than close body mics. Fine during projected vocals for songs and ensemble numbers but 99% of the dialogue was lost on me at the back. As a result I really didn't follow the book. The music was beautiful and the parts of the dialogue I did catch sold the whole package to me. An interesting piece, had I had more time I'd revisit. Again I hope this sees a life post-Fringe.
Friday evening was another big risk. Sold out for the duration of the week I'd been hoping to catch
My Left/Right Foot based on recommendations from this thread. Throughout the week I'd tried unsuccessfully for returns but with 90 minutes to the show at the Assembly Hall box office I tried one final, futile time, this time with success. 1 returned ticket. The Fringe Gods shining down on me, I snatched it up. A potentially dangerous subject matter My Left/Right Foot tackles the attitudes and stigma that comes with disability. Full of moments I found myself laughing at and then appalled at myself for my reaction. So intelligently approached and effectively delivered just one element ruined the biggest show of the Fringe for me. Prior to the performance we were informed that someone with tourettes would be watching the show. Great, I thought, this has the potential to make for an even more salient performance. Unfortunately a row of middle aged *insert insulting adjective here* spent the entire performance in absolutely hysterics at every one of the ticks emitted. The whole point of the whole show completely circumventing their collective brain cell. Incredibly infuriating. A number of people in the vicinity, including myself, found themselves turning round and glaring in disgust impotently. Absolute shame. I'm sat here a day later wondering perhaps if that row thought the ticks were part of the show. I mean in hindsight, if that was the case, that would be genius. But I'm positive it wasn't the case. There were good moments though. Having been a part of amateur groups as a child, there was a lot I was able to associate with. Also, I absolutely love it when cast engage you by the eyes and deliver lines directly to you. This happened many times during the songs and made it for me. Perhaps they'd registered what was going on.
A quick stroll down to Waverley Station and onto the last train home. A wonderful 3 days of distraction from reality. Irregularly I question my interest in the arts, I had done again recently but this visit reaffirmed my love, not just for one style but for theatre as a whole. It did make me realize how archaic Theatre Board is in its approach to categorizing theatre. Musicals, Plays, Opera. Thats yer lot. There's so much more out there and a real blurring of lines inbetween. It's great to binge on culture like this and I will 100% be returning to Edinburgh Fringe in the future, hopefully for a longer duration.
One side note. Boy the coffee scene in strong in Edinburgh. Had some very good cups of joe around town, most notably at Lowdown Coffee & Cult. If your a coffee fan, get to either or both.
