Fringe Diary: Look Forward
It’s all very well staging thousands of challenging new productions for a month in one city, but what about the future life of those productions, and what about all the audiences that never made it to Edinburgh?
Fringe Diary: Red For Danger
C Venues have handed Belt Up the keys to one of their performance spaces and let them run riot. The company named it the Red Room and wrapped it in a patchwork of carpets, silk drapes, armchairs, cushions, beds, mirrors and empty picture frames, creating a kind of faded, derelict glamour.
Padamme, Padamme ****
Fluid movement work grants the terminally ill characters – played by a largely teenage cast – a kind of dignified grace, as they come to terms with their conditions through denial, philosophy or love.
The 7 Deadly Sins ****
You’re all going to Hell. That’s the message the Tiger Lillies are gleefully preaching with the help of a punk Mister Punch and his civil partner Jude.
Fringe Diary: Physical Education
In 21 years the closest I’ve come to experiencing physical theatre is A Level Theatre Studies and a few ill-informed cracks about interpretive dance. Where better to overcome my ignorance than the Fringe?
Miss Sign-On *
Every negative stereotype of musical theatre is confirmed in this attempt at satire.
The Rebel Cell ****
Rap is the language of rebellion in Babasword Productions’ dystopian futuristic England.
Reasonable Doubt ****
Two former jurors reunite in a hotel room two years after a controversial hung verdict in this smart two-hander from Australian playwright Suzie Miller.
Fringe Diary: Fringe Firsts
After spending the majority of my time in C Venues and the Underbelly – most of whose theatre spaces are fairly makeshift – stepping into the Traverse feels a bit like warping back to Theatreland.
Mommie and the Minister ****
Gerard Anthony has created a monster. The titular Mommie of this Hammer Horror homage is part drag queen, part Methodist preacher, part Bride of Frankenstein.
