189 Reviews for the 2015 Edinburgh
Fringe Festival (In order from most enjoyable to least)
Welcome
to the 2015 version of my Fringe reviews.
I again tailored 10 days of my schedule to that of my friend Tim’s. He is much more knowledgeable about the
production qualities of the companies.
You can see my 2015 schedule. You can find out about me, and my extended thoughts about reviewing at the bottom of this
page. I think that the most useful
aspect for my readers is the rankings. I
base the rankings on my enjoyment of the show, so they may not reflect the
quality of the script and/or acting. I
prefer plays to comedy acts, but work in a little of the latter for
diversity. I have discovered that I have
a penchant for true stories. The
comments are usually only three sentences long because I have little time
between shows, and, after all, I am here for the shows. You can also see my 165 reviews for 2014 Fringe, 152 reviews for 2013 Fringe, 135 reviews for 2012
Fringe, 175
reviews for 2011 Fringe, 200 reviews for 2010
Fringe, 177
reviews for 2009 Fringe, 153 reviews for 2008 Fringe, 162 reviews for 2006
Fringe, and 151
reviews for 2005 Fringe. I
always enjoy chatting with both audience members and dramatic artists. If you wish to contact me, send e-mail to Sean Davis.
You
can change the sorting column of the table below by first clicking anywhere in
its header. Each succeeding click in the
header sorts the table by the column clicked.
Succeeding clicks of a column will reverse the previous sort order. I have now added a Date column so that
returning viewers can sort by it to see my most recent reviews. (The ranking
numbers are bit messed up to allow this, but I haven’t had the time to debug
the change in Word that causes the problem)
|
Rank |
Title and Review |
Venue |
Times |
Date |
|
1. |
A Girl is a Half-formed
Thing (*****) A girl grows up with an
older brother with brain cancer, an unhappy mother, and no father, and then a
rape alters her whole life. This is
the performance to see this year. Aoife
Duffin moves easily from one character to another in an instant with
subtlety, and yet clarity, even when but a word or two must be said before
returning. |
Traverse |
Varies |
11 |
|
2. |
Jethro Compton’s Frontier
Trilogy: Blood Red Moon (*****) This first, and best, part of
the trilogy has two dissimilar brothers coming West to pan for gold in a
claim they purchased. This is a
classic story of the Western genre with more complex interactions among the
characters than most such movies allowed.
The strengths and weaknesses of both men come to the fore at different
times as their circumstances change. I
should note that each story of the trilogy easily stands alone, but they are
tangentially connected in chronological order. |
C nova |
17:10 – 18:20 |
8 |
|
3. |
Jethro Compton’s Frontier
Trilogy: The Clock Strikes Noon (*****) The second part of the
trilogy takes place in a two-room isolated church where a farmer and the
sheriff prepare for an onslaught of gunmen hired by the rapacious
railroad. As with the first story, the
setting may be classic, but the addition of the daughter of the railroad’s
owner as a tough negotiator allows the story to transcend the clichés of the
genre, and develop in novel ways.
There are subtleties here, where each person can legitimately change
their mind on important matters. I
should note that each story of the trilogy easily stands alone, but they are
tangentially connected in chronological order. |
C nova |
21:10 – 22:15 |
8 |
|
4. |
I Went to a Fabulous Party
(*****) A gay couple invite a bunch
of gay men to their house for a party.
Even though sex dominates the conversations and movements, the diverse
cast finds ways to assert each of their individualities in catty and loving
ways. I wish I could list each
character because they combine into such a satisfying mélange despite or
because of their diversity. |
C too |
22:40 – 23:45 |
18 |
|
5. |
Out of the Blue (*****)
The guys from Oxford were back with their great songs and
choreographed hijinks for their best show in years. One of my traditions is to see them on the
last day of the Fringe when they are decked out in kilts, and they are aware
that it is their last concert before this group disbands. Besides the music, it is always touching to
see their camaraderie. |
Assembly George Square |
14:15 – 15:05 |
31 |
|
6. |
Jethro Compton’s Frontier
Trilogy: Rattlesnake Kiss (*****) After relishing the first
two parts of the trilogy, this story of the padre of a small, isolated,
church and a lawman looking for an outlaw provided a satisfying conclusion to
the saga. As with the other two
stories, there is no black hat or white hat here--everyone is both flawed and
virtuous. In this case, the seeming
treachery of a woman has repercussions for her and her victim that
reverberate through the entire story.
I should note that each story of the trilogy easily stands alone, but
they are tangentially connected in chronological order. |
C nova |
22:30 – 23:35 |
8 |
|
7. |
Love Birds (*****) The star attraction of a
vaudeville troupe composed entirely of birds decides to leave, and the rest
of the performers offer new acts that their conservative manager finds
objectionable. With its strong voices,
good lyrics, colorful costumes, catch tunes, smart choreography, and cute
story, this show is ready to tour. The
penguin barbershop quartet fulfill their Mary Poppins promise by being both
harmonious and quick dancers. |
Pleasance Courtyard |
12:35 – 13:35 |
18 |
|
8. |
Doris, Dolly, and the
Dressing Room Divas (*****) Three dressers and an
expressive pianist provide short biographies and impersonated songs of Judy Garland,
Doris Day, Julie Andrews, Liza Minelli, and Dolly Parton. Each singer captures the style of her
celebrity with three familiar songs that enchanted the crowd. Besides the singers, I found that I enjoyed
the wonderful expressions of their accomplished accompanist. |
Assembly Hall |
18:15 – 19:30 |
16 |
|
9. |
The Paradise Project
(*****) This two hander about
creating utopian societies uses two modes: 1) reading short stories relating
to the topic, and 2) having a couple spending weeks building and living in a fallout
shelter to learn what rules to set and how to set them. Both the stories and the experiment proved
thought provoking and worthy of long discussions afterwards. The story about a dying 400-year old tree
served to highlight the uniqueness of this time, and the effort to set up a
voting for just two people was both difficult and hilarious |
Summerhall |
17:40 – 18:50 |
17 |
|
10. |
The Solid Life of Sugar
Water (*****) A couple takes turns giving
their impressions of their dates, time in bed, and dealing with her pregnancy. Even though he has a deformed arm and she
is deaf those are irrelevant to the vast majority of the story. Their descriptions of their thinking during
sex are graphic, and his more closely matched mine that I’ve ever heard or
read. |
Pleasance Dome |
16:00 – 17:20 |
30 |
|
11. |
Cornermen (*****) An unemployed trio of
manager, trainer, and cutman, sign a young amateur boxer, and try to guide
him to a championship. There is no
actual boxing in this play, instead this is a story about the fight game from
the vantage point of fight contracts, strategy sessions, and tactics during a
fight. The ultimate fight is a chess
game that reveals the loyalties of all involved. |
Pleasance Courtyard |
14:45 – 16:00 |
24 |
|
12. |
Ed Byrne – Outside Looking
In (*****) Byrne provided his usual
mix of funny stories that were full of sly wit. His stories ranged from bombing in front of
bankers to a weeklong bout of diarrhea to dealing with people expressing
their annoyance when he brings his kids into a Costa coffee shop. I loved his story of supporting his 4-year
old boy’s selection of sparkly pink trainers with hearts on them. |
Gilded Balloon Teviot |
21:00 – 22:00 |
30 |
|
13. |
Tomorrow (*****) We see the life in a home
for senior citizens with diminished capacity that has a caring and
experienced staff. I know that it
sounds dull, but the staging using full head masks and the matter of factness
of staff in the face of unusual behavior gives this a verisimilitude that
often brought tears to my eyes. The
initial assembly line for creating those masks and then handed to adults as
if they were babies was a perfect metaphor for adults who find that they must
care for parents who cannot care for themselves. |
Traverse |
Varies |
11 |
|
14. |
A Gambler’s Guide to Dying
(*****) Gary McNair recounts his
grandfather’s gambling philosophy, and how it influenced their close
friendship. Of how to prolong a dream,
and allowing a bet to energize a cancer ridden walk to death. The tale of his Scottish grandfather’s mob
beating in a bar after betting on England revealed a realist who was willing
to accept both the winning and losing in life. |
Traverse |
Varies |
6 |
|
15. |
Foxfinder (*****) In a desperate future
England, an ascetic foxfinder arrives at a farm to search for evidence of a
fox infestation that is supposedly the source of all the ills of the
nation. The parallel to Jews in Nazi
Germany is obvious, but the play’s strength lies in the three different ways
the farmer, his wife, and the foxfinder respond to the fruitless search. I loved how the farmer’s view of the
government’s response to the events in the finale was fantastical, and yet a
probably a good prediction. |
Bedlam Theatre |
19:30 – 21:00. |
9 |
|
16. |
Fully Committed starring
Marcus Brigstocke (*****) Besides taking reservation
requests for a restaurant, a harried telephone receptionist must deal with a
demanding chef/owner, a remote matre d’, and various interruptions from
staff, friends, and family. Brigstocke
does a remarkable job of providing different characterizations in quick
succession for each of the oft repeated pantheon. Layered on top of this acting, we have
several stories of his father, auditions, and extraordinary responsibilities
that the plot neatly solves in a very satisfying way. |
Underbelly Potterrow |
14:00 – 15:10 |
20 |
|
17. |
The Hitchhiker’s Guide to
the Family (*****) Ben Norris tells of taking
a hitchhiking trip in reverse order of the houses his taciturn father lived
in to try to better understand him
Though unmentioned, he had a cameraman along to take photos and videos
that play with animated maps to show his progress in a humorous fashion on a
large backdrop. His word choice,
particularly his metaphors, really made the show special. |
Underbelly Cowgate |
16:40 – 17:45 |
28 |
|
18. |
How to Keep an Alien
(*****) A perky Irish actress
describes meeting her Australian lover, and then their long, complex, and
erratic efforts to allow her to emigrate to Ireland. From their initial miming of fantastical
methods of suicide while rehearsing a dreadful play, to a wonderful collage
of photos of the pair at the end, this is a heartwarming tale of devotion in
the face of bureaucratic adversity.
The omnipresent huge binder of their assembled documentation serves as
a constant reminder just how mammoth their task was. |
Traverse |
Varies |
6 |
|
19. |
Man to Man (*****) We follow a woman’s life in
Germany from the advent of Nazism to the fall of the Berlin Wall as she
assumes the identity of her husband to survive. The actress further demonstrates her
desperation as she hides in a suitcase, perches on a roof, and literally
climbs the walls. This is not a
simplistic tale of a victim, for she also seduces, kills, and abuses others. |
Underbelly Potterrow |
17:40 – 18:55 |
23 |
|
20. |
Urinetown (*****) This deconstructed musical
is set in a drought ravaged town where there is a law \that all citizens must
use toilet facilities owned by a big corporation. This well executed musical is full of
self-referential remarks on how things are done in musicals. The show allows itself to violate some of
the standard motifs because it is not a “happy” musical |
Assembly Hall |
11:45 – 14:00 |
19 |
|
21. |
Confessional by Tennessee
Williams (****) The regular patrons in low
end bar have the raw interactions that only familiarity and booze can
produce. While the staging with a
divided audience is problematic for hearing, the company performs William’s
deeply felt dialog beautifully.
Whether dealing with a girl she’s supported, an unfaithful lover, or
an unlicensed doctor, the hairdresser protagonist dissects each person with a
perfectly aimed jagged knife rant. |
C cubed |
19:05 – 20:20 |
6 |
|
22. |
As Is (****) This play from the mid
1980s is about how a gay man and those around him deal with his diagnosis and
treatment for AIDS. Though the play is
thirty years old it works well as both a reminder of the initial panic of the
AIDS epidemic, and the more general theme of support for those in need. The key to the success of the show is the
wit and bitterness of the protagonist and the depth of caring of his lover. |
Bedlam Theatre |
11:30 – 13:00 |
15 |
|
23. |
Around the World in 80 Days
(****) In the 1870s, Phileas Fogg
makes a wager that he can circumnavigate the world in 80 days, and then we
see his attempt to do it with his French valet, a suspicious English police
detective, an American adventuress.
This low tech production keeps the light hearted story rolling along
at a pace that never had me looking at my watch. The elephant made of a head of cord, a
trunk of 45 rpm records, and feet of toilet plungers was a wonderful creation. |
C south |
14:15 – 15:55 |
26 |
|
24. |
Nelson: The Sailors’ Story
(****) Nocholas Collett portrays
several sailors from the Battle of Trafalgar, including Admiral Nelson, as
well as a homeless survivor of a Falkland War ship that was sunk. His tale of the battle is riveting as he
switches back and forth from Nelson to his ship’s doctor to a gunner to
powder monkey. He did a good job of
differentiating the roles, except that the introduction of the homeless
sailor was confusing. |
Zoo |
17:10 – 18:10 |
31 |
|
25. |
In Light of … (****) Two women rely on free word
associating, a beach ball, a deck of giant playing cards, little lights, and
physical movements to symbolize confrontation or supportive friendship. This is one of those plays where I was
never sure what was going on, but it all felt right. As a case in point, the deck of cards were
originally used in some unexplained card game, but later they seemed to
represent either photos or memories. |
Sweet |
18:15 – 19:10 |
30 |
|
26. |
The Blues Brothers – Live
(****) Jake and Elwood are back with
three backup singers and a septet to
provide rock and blues from the 1960s.
This show is part of my first and last day ritual for the Fringe
because I like to get a chance to get out and dance to some good music. The band is tight, the singers talented,
the musical director is having a good time, and the entire audience usually
gets out of their seats and shakes their booties |
C Chamber St. |
22:45 – 23:40 |
5 |
|
27. |
The Girl from Nowhere
(****) In the 1960s, a runaway country
singer discovers Janis Joplin’s style, but is haunted by her small Texas town
roots. Despite the radical musical
change her progression feels inevitable in hindsight. The sincere snippets of music that she
performs add to both the ambience, and an understanding of her talent and
drive. |
Pleasance Courtyard |
12:45 – 13:45 |
5 |
|
28. |
Swallow (****) A disfigured jilted lover,
a transvestite, and a fearful hermit each must overcome adversity in their
own way. The held my interest because
the paths they used were so different and yet fit their circumstances and
life story. The use of a lost pelican
as an avenue to recovery seemed inspired |
Traverse |
Varies |
11 |
|
29. |
A Life With the Beatles
(****) Ian Sexon plays Neil
Aspinall, who was the Beatle’s road manager and CEO of Apple Corps,
describing his backstage experiences from the earliest days until they broke
up. This show is full of little
tidbits that kept it interesting to a Beatlephile like me. He evoked the claustrophobic feeling toward
the end of their touring particularly well. |
Sweet Grassmarket |
17:15 – 18:15 |
21 |
|
30. |
Adam Hills: Clown Heart
(****) As usual, Hills presented a
good-hearted show that combined spontaneity and some routines. This time the spontaneity was based on
trying to phone the wife of an audience member and have it seem like he was
at a wild party, and the routines involved child rearing, his father dying,
and a friend dying of cancer who poses nude online every Tuesday. It was touching that his father and he had
a tradition of ending each of their conversations “on a high note” by
finishing by each vocalizing a high pitch. |
Assembly Hall |
19:30 – 20:30 |
24 |
|
31. |
Christians (****) A pastor of an American
mega-church gives a sermon that hell does not exist, and though the initial
reaction is muted, the repercussions grow in unexpected ways. The large chorus establishes the mood of
the evangelical church well, the pastor is charismatic, his argument is
sound, and the voices heard keep the play interesting, but the play is
flawed. Later songs contribute little,
and the otherwise thoughtful pastor never tries to defuse the situation by
appealing to Jesus’ role as the forgiving son of God. |
Traverse |
Varies |
11 |
|
32. |
Dylan Thomas: The Man, The
Myth (****) Guy Masterson and the
granddaughter of Dylan Thomas present a biography of the Welsh poet by
alternating her reading from her book about Thomas’ life, and Masterson
performing excerpts from his works while photos of cited locations were
projected above them. I could not ask
for a better arrangement of information, images, and live performance. It was a pleasure to see Masterson recite
poetry he clearly relishes. |
Assembly Roxy |
13:30 – 14:30 |
8 |
|
33. |
The Communist Threat (****) In the 1950s, two British
MI5 agents, who do not know each other, meet in Vienna to carry out an
assassination. One is an erudite
assassin, and the other a working class guy who doesn’t work in the field,
but their probing question of each other hint at a distrust of
strangers. The plot seems obvious to us,
but the twists still caught me. |
Zoo Southside |
10:40 – 11:40 |
24 |
|
34. |
Raz by Jim Cartwright
(****) This fast paced play has a
very fit truck driver reliving his night out with his buddies mixing drugs
and pub crawling. As the leader of his
group, he executes his plan for a good time with military precision that
works well as long as he is in control of himself. From his initial self-conscious selection
of clothing and tanning method to his keen awareness of the limitations of
his friends to his fleeting glimpses of his former lover the whole play is
keenly written with a fast wit, and a knowing finale. |
Assembly George Square |
16:00 – 17:00 |
17 |
|
35. |
The Great Downhill Journey
of Little Tommy (****) A four piece rock band, with
a pen and ink artist drawing on a huge shadow canvas behind them, tell a
musical tale of a young man’s adventure as he meets workmen, a hunter, and
even a liquor distiller. Though the
music ranged across many styles, I enjoyed it all. I sat right in front of the manic
keyboardist/guitarist, and was amazed at both his virtuosity and how much he
perspired during the show. |
Summerhall |
22:30 – 23:40 |
29 |
|
36. |
Walking the Tightrope: The
Tension Between Art and Politics (****) In response to three
cultural events being closed last summer because of political pressure, the
Underbelly commissioned twelve plays addressing freedom of expression. The seven today had: 1) a major donor
objecting to new rules that would prevent her son from interning for her
theater charity; 2) a playwright unable to find an insult that his producers
think would not offend someone; 3) a Black man violently sodomizes a drugged
White woman volunteer in front of an audience as a “legitimate” piece of art;
4) two actors arguing about the need to update the Koran while slowly
becoming clowns; 5) a Black auditioning actress objecting to participating in
one of the three closed plays that was written by a White but has an all
Black cast performing as if they were in a zoo; 6) a young Fringe actor arguing
with his mother as to whether a theater company should be boycotted because
one of their funding source; and 7) repeating an innocuous scene, and
changing the nouns to different politically charged words in each version. Though some of the well-acted plays were
patently absurd, others were quite thought provoking. |
Underbelly Potterrow |
15:35 – 17:05 |
22 |
|
37. |
Sweet Dreams: Songs by
Annie Lennox (****) Michael Griffiths charmed
us as he used a chronological biography of Annie Lennox to introduce his interpretations
of his songs. He had only a keyboard
so he wisely did not try to go for the full power of many of her songs. |
Assembly Bosco |
18:00 -19:00 |
20 |
|
38. |
Crash (****) A financial advisor looks
back at the highs and lows of the past year of his personal and financial
life. Though his egoless approach to
financial decisions has allowed him to cut his losses and made him a
successful businessman, the play cleverly demonstrates how that it is much
harder to apply to his personal life.
His final financial triumph while reeling from betrayal neatly
underscores this difference. |
Traverse |
Varies |
6 |
|
39. |
Big Bite Size Breakfast
Show (Menu 3) (****) This show had six
mini-plays: a man raises a duckling that become his closest friend; a
prostitute, her john, and her jilted lover uses single words to communicate;
a passive door-to-door trainee is tutored; a man lacking the sense of touch
meets a woman who lacks the sense of smell and taste; at a bus stop at man
meets a woman who goes through life rating kissers; and an Australian
construction worker deals with an unwanted friend request from Cate
Blanchett. Unlike Menu 1, each of
these plays had at least one character about whom I cared, and made each have
some larger meaning. The feeling of
unexpected rejection by the naïve imprinted duck, the automatic position of
outsider of a person lacking touch or smell, and the different view of acting
of the hardhat, each made their plays more interesting and worthwhile for me. |
Pleasance Courtyard |
10:30 – 11:30 |
7 |
|
40. |
Little Thing,
Big Thing (****) A petty ex-con
and a nun are chased across Ireland for a mysterious roll of film she
has. The chemistry between the
unlikely buddies is in evidence throughout their many narrow escapes. This has a finely tuned mix of danger,
evolving friendship, and comedy that is rare. |
Assembly George Square |
15:40 – 17:00 |
12 |
|
41. |
17 Border
Crossings (****) As the title
indicates, Thaddeus Phillips describes 17 border crossings ranging from the
troubled crossing from Hungary to Yugoslavia during the 1990s war to a
psychological border during a during a drug induced mental trip in South
America. No matter the variation he
always succeeded at conveying the germane sensations of crossing the border. From a description of a delivery of a
bucket of KFC chicken through a Gaza Strip tunnel to a motor scooter trip
across a Peru-Brazil border with a rod to beat back stray dog packs, the
diversity and imagery created was remarkable. |
Summerhall |
18:35 – 19:50 |
27 |
|
42. |
John Godber’s
Happy Jack (****) A tough old
coal miner and his wife tell his life story starting from his entering the
mines at 16, and through their working class married life. While they spent much of their lives
squabbling it was clear that they always loved each other. |
Quaker Meeting House |
18:15 – 19:30 |
19 |
|
43. |
Underneath
(****) Pat Kinevane
first interacts with audience members, and then he mixes movement and speech
to tell the story of a badly disfigured girl who must constantly deal with
ridicule from her peers, but is aided by her neighbors and employers. Kinevane is charming, and seeing his
tattered black costumed figure swirl in sheets of gold lame provide a great
metaphor for the girl’s efforts to hide.
The powerful final act has an appropriate harsh mix of injustice and
justice. |
Dance Base |
19:30 – 21:00 |
14 |
|
44. |
Trevor Noah:
Lost in Translation (****) Noah started by
pointing out how there could never be Black James Bond because he could never
disappear into an Edinburgh crowd to escape bad guys, and the rest of the
show continued to focus on prejudice in the world. He did have many funny routines including
being under suspicion for Ebola on an airplane because he transferred from
Africa, and another about trying to figure out how to behave to prevent being
shot by a cop when he was pulled over by a Los Angeles cop. I left feeling that he was a one trick
pony, and wondered how he will do in the more political world of the Daily
Show. |
Assembly Hall |
22:30 – 23:30 |
28 |
|
45. |
Camille
O’Sullivan – Brel (****) The
French-Irish singer returns to the songwriter of her youth to interpret 14 of
Jacque Brel’s songs. I see Camille
every year, and she never fails to impress me with her heartfelt voice and
her playful interactions with her band and the audience. I only gave this four stars because the
band played so loud at times that many of Brel’s lyrics eluded me. |
The Queen’s Hall |
22:30 – 0:00 |
15 |
|
46. |
Ndeble Funeral
(****) In a
Johannesburg slum, a HIV positive woman is visited by an upbeat friend and
then a white government auditor. Unlike
previous South African stories this show leaves apartheid behind, and looks
at how harsh life still is even under the ANC. The combination of duets by the friends,
the trio’s native dancing, and a creative coffin made from flood supplies
creates a multi-faceted picture of country now. |
Summerhall |
13:00 – 14:00 |
10 |
|
47. |
Two Sore Legs
(****) Brenda Murphy
tells of her life in Belfast where she had six children by a married man, and
had to deal with disapproval from almost all corners, and yet created a loving
family. This is a wonderful mix of
family joys, the Irish troubles, and the complexity of being Catholic in a
modern world. It was always fun to
hear of her disapproving father nonetheless taking on the sanctimonious
priest. |
Assembly George Square |
12:35 – 13:35 |
12 |
|
48. |
I am Not Myself
These Days (****) Tom Stuart
plays an alcoholic transvestite who re-enacts his year in New York City,
including his months of living with his male prostitute boyfriend. His “Aqua” persona, who had two
hemispherical goldfish aquariums for breasts, had a complex mix of flash and
softness that seemed real though pathetically doomed. The key to the power of the play lays in
the surreal mix of queen shows, love, crack, bondage, and alcohol. |
Pleasance Courtyard |
16:15 – 17:30 |
26 |
|
49. |
Trans Scripts
(****) Several
transgender women recreate verbatim conversations from others about their
experiences from abuse to societal acceptance to their own comfort in their
new bodies. The wide range of social, economic,
and race of the women allowed us to hear of both their common and special
experiences. I was surprised when I
was the audience member offered to feel the large breasts of one who asserted
they were natural, and due simply to hormone therapy. |
Pleasance Courtyard |
15:00 – 16:30 |
15 |
|
50. |
Tonight with
Donny Stixx (****) A teenager on
the autism scale with a demanding mother loves to perform his magic
show. The actor’s alternating between
actual speech and his inner thoughts is easily accepted by the audience and
critical to understanding the boy.
Though his autism explains most of his actions, his dismissal of his
father seemed poorly explained. |
Pleasance Courtyard |
14:45 – 16:00 |
13 |
|
51. |
The Jennifer
Tremblay Trilogy Part I: The List (****) In rural Canada, a woman
uses lists to create hierarchy of her many activities, but finds that her
system has failed her. She is a
wonderfully conflicted woman who wanted to come to the country, but then
finds little has improved in her life, and now she feels isolated besides. Her link with her best friend, who
approaches life and mothering in a much different way, serves as the
wellspring for the bulk of the play. |
Assembly Roxy |
12:20 – 13:20 |
8 |
|
52. |
Wendy Hoose by Johnny
McKnight (****) After meeting on a chat
room a young fellow visits a woman at her home for a mutually agreed upon one
night stand. The show takes an
unexpected turn when he finds that she has no legs, and explores the
prejudices of both people. The
accommodations have a perfect pacing. |
The Assembly Rooms |
15:30 – 16:30 |
21 |
|
53. |
Heartbeats and Algorithms
(****) A computer programmer must
contend with a program she wrote that starts to accurately predict her
actions. Her low key personality suits
the physical displacement of the initial virtual chatroom, but seemed
increasingly inappropriate as she becomes more desperate to become
unpredictable. Nonetheless, whether
intended or not, her unanswered request for someone with which to dance
seemed emblematic of the difficulty of leaving a virtual life. |
Pleasance Courtyard |
14:15 – 15:15 |
5 |
|
54. |
Down and Out in
Paris and London (****) To learn of
poverty first hand, Eric Blair (pen name George Orwell) moved into a working
class tenement in Paris, and in 2003 Polly Toynbee moves into social housing
in London. Both learn of the many
unexpected difficulties that the poor must confront just to survive. This is a good clean tale of immersion in
poverty with the poor portrayed as neither heroes nor villains, but with
economic predators everywhere. |
Pleasance Courtyard |
18:30 – 19:30 |
5 |
|
55. |
A Fine Line
(****) A senior
citizen recounts her lifelong loving with her childhood best friend. Whether describing dealing with the
animosity of the husband of her friend, or the pair’s shared grief, she
conveyed a quiet equanimity that inspired me.
Though her love was as deep as any, the lack of sexual tension made it
all the more pure. |
Assembly Hall |
15:10 – 16:10 |
7 |
|
56. |
64 Squares
(****) In 1939, the
story alternates between a Viennese lawyer held in solitary confinement by the
Gestapo, and that same lawyer on a cruise ship playing chess with the world
champion. The stories neatly
intertwine as the real story unfolds.
Though chess is obviously part of the start, you need not be an
aficionado to enjoy the interplay between the two settings. |
Underbelly Cowgate |
19:30 – 20:40 |
7 |
|
57. |
The Night Watch
(****) In 18th
century Spain, a British sergeant carries an injured boy he had hired as a
spy into the night watch’s tent only to have his captain discover that the
boy is a girl scared of mistreatment by the British. The play spends much of its time having the
captain and the girl argue over the impact and morality of war. Just as these arguments are exhausted the
discovery of a watch and letter allows the story to investigate a whole other
set of values dealing with honor and family. |
C nova |
12:30 – 13:30 |
31 |
|
58. |
The Remnants:
Threadbare (****) The bulk of
this show has the girlfriend of a research social scientist tell a story of
two lovers that are live and on video.
The interactions between the lovers has a ring of truth that most
young companies miss, and I liked the added discussion the temporal
relationship of thought and emotion.
The problem here lies in the scientist’s dismissive attitude toward
his girlfriend’s story that is jarring, and ill founded. |
C nova |
21:30 – 22:30 |
14 |
|
59. |
What Would
Spock Do? (****) A fellow
describes how he loved the Star Trek TV program as a kid, and yet did not
know how to respond when he later met an attractive woman who idolized Mr.
Spock. As a former trekkie (or trekker
if you wish), I could relate to his enthusiasm, though his loud declarations
seemed more like an actor than a fan.
I liked the way the story hinges on the events of Leonard Nimoy’s
life. |
Gilded Balloon Teviot |
12:30 – 13:30 |
22 |
|
60. |
Iphigenia in
Splott (****) This solo show
has a beautiful young woman, who spends her time clubbing and drinking
herself into oblivion, meeting the man of her dreams. While the clubbing section is fairly
standard, the bulk of the story is more interesting because she becomes a
more nuanced character. The outcome of
her law suit allowed the play to do some preaching—maybe a little too much. |
Pleasance Dome |
13:50 – 15:00 |
29 |
|
61. |
Abacus (****) Using two
Steadicams and visualization software a man argues that our current political
system of nation states is obsolete and does not promote altruism on a large
scale. He is personable and
persuasive, and the Steadicams plugged into video processors makes many
interesting images. I was so
fascinated by the Steadicams the I spent much of my time watching their
operators. |
Summerhall |
18:10 – 19:05 |
26 |
|
62. |
The Rat Pack – Live (****)
Backed by a ten piece band, Frank, Dean, and Sammy clown around and
sing standards as well as some interesting, more obscure, songs. This is part of my first day ritual because
it is consistently a pleasure to watch, though I may have become a little
jaded. I appreciated that the musical
director allowed more instrument solos this year, and that this year’s “Dean”
actually sung in Martin’s casual style. |
C Chamber St |
20:10 – 21:05 |
5 |
|
63. |
Big Shots
(****) Besides an
abridged story of the movie “The Godfather,” this homage also has scenes
dedicated to Mario Puzo, Al Pacino, Marlon Brando, and the cultural diversity
of the six-member cast. Most of the
scenes involve precisely choreographed movements of the entire company that
are incredibly well done, as well as frequent songs with live and recorded
music. The problem with the show is that all the tangential scenes lead to a
fragmented play that lacks any of the impact of the original storyline. |
Bedlam Theatre |
16:30 – 1735 |
19 |
|
64. |
Going Viral
(****) Daniel Bye uses
a tale of the spread of a virus that causes uncontrollable weeping as a
touchstone to explore viruses and their epidemiology. He combines interacting with the audience
as himself to educate with performing parts of the larger tale that provide
real reasons for weeping. I liked the
audience guessing game for the Basic Reproduction Number (the average number
of cases one case generates during its infectious period) revealed that ebola
is only 2, and measles is 18, but I found that he was not clear which
character he was when telling his stories. |
Summerhall |
14:10 – 15:20 |
23 |
|
65. |
Spillikin: A
Love Story (****) It is 2029, and
a widow suffering from Alzheimer’s disease starts to think that the robot
designer for her by her i husband is her husband, while two other actors
recreate their dating experience. The
high tech robot piqued my interest, but by adding her interest in the best
man, the husband’s social incompetence become more intriguing. |
Pleasance Dome |
17:10 – 18:30 |
25 |
|
66. |
Wilde Without
the Boy (****) Gerard Logan
plays Oscar Wilde recounting his addiction to his young lover, Lord Alfred
Douglas, that led Wilde to spend two years in jail and permanent
bankruptcy. Utilizing many of Wilde’s
words from “De Profundis” this at once beautiful and heartbreaking as the
literate Wilde repeatedly falls under the spell of Douglas despite knowing
better. Wilde’s anguish permeates the
whole story, but I was left with the question of how much of this portrayal
was accurate, and how much was a 21st century imagining of a gay
man who championed aestheticism. |
Assembly Hall |
11:00 – 12:00 |
12 |
|
67. |
Black is the
Color of My Voice (****) Apphia Campbell
plays a singer closely based on the life of Nina Simone. Her character moves from Bach piano prodigy
and gospel singer supported by her parents and community to become a jazz
singer who included civil rights issues in her songs. Her voice is strong, and the story of Black
prejudice straightforward. |
Gilded Balloon Teviot |
13:15 – 14:15 |
25 |
|
68. |
Fake It ‘til
You Make It (****) The husband of
the actress Bryony Kimmings, who suffers from clinical depression, performs
this play with her that is about how he and she have had to deal with his
illness. This is a hard play for me to
rate because on the one hand I admire his courage to appear before an
audience, and on the other hand, had he not been the actor the play would
have much less power. I did like his
various headdresses to shield his eyes, and a little metal sculpture/machine
that was never quite explained. |
Traverse |
Varies |
15 |
|
69. |
Open (****) The customers
of a takeaway shop the night before the last election voice their opinions to
each other or just the audience on a wide range of topics including the
Trident submarine, politicians being out of touch, NHS standards,
multi-culturism, poor voter turnout, and unemployment benefits. I was greatly impressed that the opinions
expressed were valid, and cut across the political spectrum without a
noticeable bias. |
Zoo |
11:00 – 11:50 |
28 |
|
70. |
Fiction (****) In a completely
dark room, each audience member has a pair of headphones to take an aural
journey to a hotel, a car, and another location. As the sounds move from scene to scene it
is difficult to piece it all together, but there is a sense of dreamy
coherence by the end. Since pictures
of the recurring hotel room were projected at the beginning it was easier to imagine
the scenes set there, but the elevator and lobby settings allowed us to
translate the script into our own world. |
Pleasance Dome |
12:00 – 13:00 |
25 |
|
71. |
Hotel Paradiso
(****) Four mute
actors in large masks tell the story of a day in a family run hotel dealing with
its clientele as well as a robber and the two policemen pursing him. After an initial, slow, scene to establish
the protagonist and the routines of the hotel’s staff, the balance is fast
paced and consistently amusing. There
was one inconsistency where a murdered bellboy reappears, but otherwise this
is a smooth professional production. |
Pleasance Courtyard |
15:15 – 16:30 |
27 |
|
72. |
The Human Ear
(****) The estranged
brother of a woman shows up at her door only for her to learn shortly from a
policeman that her brother may have been found dead five days earlier. The acting is amazing as the two actors
switch between times and roles in instant as the lights change, sometimes for
only a word. While quick changes
highlight the skill of the actors, it also makes the story disjoint to the
point that the motivation of the “brother” is lost. |
Summerhall |
15:35 – 16:45 |
10 |
|
73. |
Impossible
(****) Harry Houdini
has develops a friendship with the spiritualist/author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
despite Houdini revealing famous mediums as frauds. Doyle’s continued belief despite evidence
to the contrary as well as his assertion that Houdini had supernatural powers
were dismaying, but based on fact. The
séance by Doyle’s wife to contact Houdini’s mother provided a wonderfully awkward
situation for Houdini. |
Pleasance Dome |
13:20 – 14:30 |
21 |
|
74. |
Citizen Puppet
(****) This puppet
comedy has the people of a town built around Jack’s beanstalk having to
respond to the disaster of the giant falling on part of their town. From an old assertive woman, to the
perplexed sheriff, to the druggy narrator each city is unique with a
different take on the event. Though the parallels with similar real
interviews were fun, they were not as witty as the company’s “Table.” |
Pleasance Courtyard |
17:00 – 18:00 |
13 |
|
75. |
Dorian Gray
(****) Smartly
executed with a cast of four using picture frames in a dance routine. |
Pleasance Dome |
16:00 – 17:00 |
20 |
|
76. |
Cinema (****) The resident
cat that survives a catastrophic fire in an Arab movie theater describes its
regular customers. The use of a cat
was an inspired creation to permit the exploration of a diverse set of
characters that had only the theater in common. The story of the fire itself takes a twist
that changes our whole perspective on the event. |
Summerhall |
10:45 – 11:45 |
13 |
|
77. |
Oak Tree (****) Tim Crouch, the
writer/director/actor of this piece, each performance guides a new,
completely unprepared actor through a story about a meeting between a hypnotist
and the father of a child that the hypnotist has killed in an auto
accident. While I still think that
this an unacceptable abuse of power by Crouch, it is at least somewhat
excusable for a play where Crouch is playing the part of person who can abuse
his power over an hypnotized subject, and does. While the double loop of power is an
interesting trick, it severely limits the actor from applying his craft
because Crouch provides virtually no background information about the father
beforehand, but the script is fixed, and leaves no room for the actor to
truly inhabit his role. |
Traverse |
Varies |
16 |
|
78. |
Jethro Compton
presents Sirenia (****) A lighthouse
keeper discovers a half-drowned woman on the rocks just before a huge
storm. This intimate setting conveys
the isolation and privations of a lighthouse well. As the play proceeds the woman’s mysterious
reason for being there keeps the plot shifting nicely. |
C nova |
20:25 – 21:05 |
23 |
|
79. |
The Girl Who
Fell in Love with the Moon (***) Five
white-faced, colorfully garbed characters each tell a tale involving some
heavenly bodies. Much of each story is
told in rhyme, and easily understood song.
Most of the action maintains the fun-filled mood, with only the final
story violating the formula to create a bittersweet finale. |
Pleasance Dome |
14:30 – 15:30 |
28 |
|
80. |
Departures: A
Song Cycle (***) A London Tube
station manager contrives to delay trains so that the waiting passengers
continue to develop a sense of community.
As the strangers pair off their Sondheim-like songs convey a wide
variety of concerns to their accepting “neighbors.” Almost all the voices are strong, and the
off stage band was superb. |
C too |
14:45 – 16:05 |
14 |
|
81. |
This Much (or
An Act of Violence Towards the Institution of Marriage) (***) Gar is living
with his fastidious lover, Anthony, but he cannot resist the wild Albert who
he meets in a park. While acted with
brio, it was hard to imagine Gar developing a relationship with either man. The final scene of breakdown was quite
strong until the last two minutes. |
Zoo |
19:45 – 20:55 |
31 |
|
82. |
Antiwords (***) The brew master
at the brewery where Vaclav Havel worked in Czechoslovakia asked him to share
a case of beer in an effort to get Havel to write a confession. In this wordless interpretation the two men
are played by two women in huge masks who actually drink several beers as the
brew master becomes drunk and Havel discretely disposes of his beer. I accepted a beer from the Havel character
at one point so she would not have to drink it. |
Summerhall |
20:25 – 21:20 |
29 |
|
83. |
Big Bite-Size
Lunch Hour: Lunch in Cairo (***) This program is
set in Cairo, and has two plays: 1) a play where a Black American Muslim
woman defends her use of a veil with her Egyptian roommate, and 2) a play in
which a Kenyan prostitute tries to seduce a quiet American celebrating his 30th
birthday. The veil story presents both
sides of the argument well, and the prostitute’s life is touching. The prostitute’s last kiss reveals the
depth of her feelings in a subtle but horrific way. |
Assembly Checkpoint |
12:10 – 13:00 |
24 |
|
84. |
Daniel Cainer:
21st Century Jew (***) Cainer sits
behind a keyboard and signs his own long songs in the style of ditties about
his family, and the life of Jews now. The
songs are creative, well performed, and address their topics. I was fascinated with a chart that showed
that due to intermarriage and different birth rates, liberal Jews are
disappearing and Orthodox Jews are proliferating. |
Underbelly Cowgate |
13:00 – 14:00 |
14 |
|
85. |
Confirmation
(****) Chris Thorpe
pursues the psychological concept of confirmation (testing for things that
confirm your view) as it applies to politics.
He spends too long talking about and assuming the role of Glen, an
intelligent racist leader who interviewed, with whom he became friends. Similarly, his discussion of whether the
Holocaust killed six million or for million Jews was much longer than
necessary. |
Summerhall |
11:50 – 13:15 |
26 |
|
86. |
The Glorious
Damnation of Eddie Small (***) A young, undisciplined,
blue grass guitar player makes a deal with the devil (a la Robert Johnson) to
become a renowned guitar player. The
blue grass performances by the four musicians were a nice break from standard
Fringe fare, but the story was pedestrian.
I felt sorry for the protagonist who had to deal with a guitar with a
string that broke just as the play started. |
Bedlam Theatre |
18:00 – 18:55 |
9 |
|
87. |
Whiskey Tango
Foxtrot (***) Rebecca
Crookshank describes her life in the RAF from basic training all the way until
she leaves the service after a tour on the Falklands. This is a take on the military where a
group of women are treated as almost equals and obey the same rules and
overcome the same obstacles as the men, but when they are isolated they are
subject to abuse. Her friendship with
her “Wing Woman,” and her soul searching after a tough leader dies gives the
show a personal touch that provides a good counterpoint to the rigid military
life in which all soldiers must live. |
Underbelly Cowgate |
16:30 – 17:30 |
9 |
|
88. |
Tony’s Last
Tape (***) Tony Benn, the
Democratic Socialist MP in the Labour Party for 47 years, makes a tape where
he reviews his life and argues his positions.
I liked his political positions, but since much of the play had to do
with politicians with which I was I was unfamiliar I had to skip over
parts. Still, I came away admiring the
man who stuck to his principles of protecting the powerless for almost a half
century despite himself being in a small minority himself. |
Pleasance Courtyard |
12:15 – 13:35 |
17 |
|
89. |
The Sunset Five
(***) This sendup of
“Oceans 11” and “Mission Impossible” has a local bar owner assemble her quiz
night compatriots to carry off a heist of the local magnate’s casino. While it was fun to see how their quiz
night specialties could be applied to the caper, the mix of high jinx and
expertise sometimes just did not work.
The final twist in the caper was quite nice, but the familial
connection to the magnate had no place here. |
Pleasance Dome |
17:40 – 18:40 |
12 |
|
90. |
The Jennifer Tremblay
Trilogy Part II:The Carousel (***) A woman
describes all the events having to do with her mother ending up in a convent
for her childhood with her mother and grandmother as touchstones. The longitudinal approach provides a
richness of context that empowers the story, but a printed family tree was
necessary to help me sort out the poorly differentiated characters. In particular, the frequent interactions
between the woman and immediate female ancestors provide a sense of
continuity as well as explanation for their actions, but there were no visual
clues as to which of the three women was speaking. |
Assembly Roxy |
12:20 – 13:20 |
9 |
|
91. |
Big Bite Size
Breakfast Show (Menu 2) (***) This show has
five mini-plays of which only three are memorable: 1) the audience votes on
the revelations made by three people in a romantic triangle; 2) a guard and a
woman argue whether she may press a mysterious red button he is guarding; and
3) three touring techno musicians complain about their boredom in a virtual
tour. Of these three, only the latter
two seemed fresh and interesting. The
banter and philosophical arguments over the button were fun, and the
extrapolation of computerized music to a computerized tour was thought
provoking. |
Pleasance Dome |
10:30 – 11:30 |
9 |
|
92. |
The Element in
the Room: A Radioactive Musical Comedy about the Death and Life of Marie
Curie (***) In order to receive a gram
of radium paid for by American women, Marie Curie had to endure a public
relations tour of America. A fellow in
drag alternates between playing Marie Curie and himself as combines tales
from Curie’s life, centering on the tour, and teaching about the properties
of radium. His clever approach to
explaining a radioactive decay chain involves passing a ball of yarn among
the audience members who happen to hold the cards of the elements in the path
from radium to lead. |
Pleasance Courtyard |
15:30 -16:30 |
5 |
|
93. |
The Orchid and
the Crow (***) A personable
survivor of stage 4 testicular cancer tells of his life as an agnostic Jew, and
his admiration for Lance Armstrong as he suffered through three months of
chemotherapy. He performs his own good
rock songs and ballads to accompany his stories that range from Passover and
Christmas celebrations to treatments while wearing a hospital gown. I particularly liked his story of his Santa
Claus denying uncle holding him still as a baby during his bris circumcision
ceremony as proof to God that the Jews will honor their god’s wishes. |
Assembly Roxy |
16:10 – 17:25 |
23 |
|
94. |
To Kill a
Machine (***) Though Alan
Turing had solved the Enigma cypher in World War II, two government agents
set about entrapping him for his homosexual activities. Gwydion Rhys portrays the Asberger
suffering Turing with a remarkably sensitive touch. The recurring game show motif of the
agents’ plotting destroys the verisimilitude that Rhys creates. |
Zoo |
20:55 – 21:55 |
27 |
|
95. |
Loch Ness
Monster Hunter (***) In the 1930s,
an adventurer arrives at Loch Ness to report to a newspaper on his search for
the Loch Ness Monster mentioned in a letter to the newspaper. This comedy combines silliness, community
spirit, and self-promotion to create a fun piece of fluff. The show does a good job of not going
across my line of silliness that would have made it just stupid and not fun
for me. |
Bedlam Theatre |
18:00 – 19:00 |
24 |
|
96. |
The Daily
Tribunal (***) Two homeless
friends are offended by a newspaper article about a middle class man who
makes a living by posing as a beggar, and keep trying to write their own
articles to earn 500 pounds from the newspaper. Though the rougher privations were ignored,
the two actors still enough time to provide a real picture of lost men that
were neither drug addicts nor mentally unbalanced. Since I was the only audience member, it
skewed the performance so that the many audience interactions had to rely on
me. |
Sweet Grassmarket |
16:30 – 17:30 |
29 |
|
97. |
Key Change
(***) We start with
an abused wife and a drug addict, and follow their lives before and inside a
women’s prison where they meet a grandmother and another woman. Even though their lives before prison have
some bearing on their prison experience, they are predictable and contribute
little. I found the portrayal of all
prison employees as caring and considerate disingenuous, and the use of
momentary lines of masking tape confusing. |
Summerhall |
12:30 – 13:30 |
23 |
|
98. |
Labels (***) A second
generation Brit of Indian descent uses self-adhesive labels to explore
prejudice. This is a fairly light play
even though his and his parents’ lives have felt prejudice and heard Paki
name calling throughout their lives. I
found the section having some of the audience making paper airplanes a waste
of time. |
Pleasance Courtyard |
12:35 – 13:35 |
29 |
|
99. |
The Mountain
Top (***) The night before
he will be assassinated Martin Luther King has an unusual conversation with
the motel’s maid. This earthy King
chain smokes, has stinky shoes, and yet must still work on his speech for the
next day. This slice of life play had
verisimilitude, but to achieve that sense of real people, the play spent too
much time on the ordinary activities of life. |
Venue 13 |
14:00 – 15:15 |
18 |
|
100. |
Grav (***) Gareth Bale
portrays Ray Granall, the famed Welsh rugby player from the 1980s and 1990s,
relating events from his life. The
show reveals a complex man who, despite being an award winning athlete, was
quite insecure in his athleticism, and contended with OCD. His tale of his home town team defeating
the mighty New Zealand reflected a charming innocent pride without a hint a
hubris. |
Assembly Hall |
13:40 – 14:55 |
6 |
|
101. |
Adam Long’s Dickens
Abridged (***) Four talented
musician/actors provide a biography of Dickens as well as abridged versions
of several of his books. As with all
of these abridgement plays, the more you know about the topic, the more you
will enjoy the whimsical allusions.
Unfortunately for me, I am not that well versed in Dickens, and so
about half of the show’s content was lost on me though I recognized topnotch
execution throughout. |
Pleasance Courtyard |
14:20 – 15:30 |
17 |
|
102. |
Pardon / In Cuffs (***) Three actors trade roles as
a Danish prosecutor and the people charged with crimes that they
interview. The verbatim work provides
a somewhat interesting glimpse into the minds of the criminals and the Dutch judicial
process. The best part was last when a
defense attorney coached a woman to tell the truth without seeming over
rehearsed |
Traverse |
Varies |
|
|
103. |
Where Do Little Birds Go?
(***) Based on a true story from
the 1960s, a young woman recounts journeying to London to work as a bar
maid/actress only to become a hostess/prostitute at a nightclub that is
kidnapped by the Kray twins to entertain an escaped murderer. Since she and her uncle knew that she was
working in a nightclub controlled by the Krays, the progression of the story,
though horrific, seemed almost inevitable and devoid of impact. The only interesting aspect was how the
murderer was portrayed sympathetically as a naïve simpleton. |
Underbelly Cowgate |
20:55 – 21:55 |
7 |
|
104. |
The Very Grey Matter of
Edward Blank (***) An audio tape transcriber
never leaves his room, and relies on four hallucinated characters to help
with his editing, but also to avoid dealing with the real world. I liked the way his day was constructed as
insane play alternating with inspired prose, with an occasional interjection
of his past life to explain how he ended up in his room. The use of a special tape as the touchstone
to possible recovery was a nice invention. |
Assembly Roxy |
17:35 -18:30 |
6 |
|
105. |
If I Were Me (***) An unassertive copy editor
who is constantly belittled in an advertising firm, attends a meeting that
should bolster his self-confidence.
The story uses a wide range of props, including tons of tennis balls
and cardboard cutouts of the fellow in a fun ways. The two scenes in an elevator are an
inspired device to demonstrate assertiveness, self-confidence, and
acceptance. |
Underbelly Cowgate |
18:05 – 19:05 |
14 |
|
106. |
Police Cops (***) This low tech send-up of
buddy cop films has a recruit seek out a retired supercop to help him tackle
the local crime lord. The plot, and
choreography were there, but they chose silliness over cleverness too often
for my taste. I particularly did not
like their choice of making the crime boss a cat for some reason. |
Zoo |
21:30 – 22:25 |
31 |
|
107. |
Mistaken:Quartet of Plays
for One Actor (***) William McGeough does a
good job of portraying four different gay men in very different
situations. The plays range from
coming out to dates gone wrong to leaving a lover. While he was a good actor, the show itself
was forgettable. |
C nova |
20:45 – 21:50 |
22 |
|
108. |
E15 (***) The cast of six tell the
stories of the homeless unwed pregnant women who led a protest about their
inadequate council housing in London.
The play has a good mix of descriptions of both the horrible
conditions and the protester’s activities, including squatting, sit-ins, and
a petition with 10,000 signatures. I
could not help but notice that one of the actresses playing a homeless leader
had a set of very expensive finger nails that really clashed with the
supposed settings. |
Gilded Balloon Teviot |
19:45 – 20:45 |
30 |
|
109. |
The Wonderful Discovery of
Witches in the County of Lancaster (***) In 1615, two former
magistrates travel the countryside with the 16-year old girl whose testimony had
her mother and grandmother killed as witches six years before. The story is really about how the trio
deals with a loss of patronage, and the teenager coming to grips wither past,
and the ongoing possibility that she is a witch. The final use of a voodoo-like doll was a
perfect revelation |
Pleasance Courtyard |
15:15 – 16:15 |
29 |
|
110. |
The Garden (***) Will the discovery of a
plan in their small apartment change the lives of a c couple living in an
overcrowded dystopia? The symbolism of
the plant is obvious, but the couple’s reactions add another layer of
complexity. This opera’s short length
and terse lyrics left me feeling that it ended abruptly, but it didn’t. |
Traverse |
Varies |
22 |
|
111. |
Jo Brand (***) The older fat comedienne is
a master of one liners, but such comedy is not my cup of tea. |
Gilded Balloon Teviot |
19:30 – 20:30 |
21 |
|
112. |
Bette Midler and Me (***) I got this one wrong;
seeing Sue Kelvin I thought she was trying to be a Bette Midler imitator,
when this was consistently a story weaving Midler’s life with how it affected
the outlook of Kelvin. I was
constantly bemoaning how Kelvin had to have another singer help provide the
power and range of Midler, when that is perfectly fine for such an
homage. My friends thought this was a
great show and story, and I regret that I was unable to shed my misguided
preconceived notions and enjoy this wonderful show. |
Gilded Balloon Teviot |
21:30 – 22:30 |
17 |
|
113. |
To Space (***) A woman conducts a science
demonstration using whey, and then recounts her lifelong goal to travel into
space even though she is not qualified because of her age and education. She well conveys her fascination with space
using NASA images and her own past efforts.
Seeing her don her own NASA space suit overalls was both sweet and
pathetic. |
Summerhall |
17:00 – 18:00 |
27 |
|
114. |
The Stolen Inches (***) The son of famous film
producer is creating documentary about his family, but then his brother sues
his family for restricting his life because he was short. Though this sounds like it would be a
satire or absurdist, the four actors play this as a reality TV show with only
the mother being unbelievable. With a
short presentation of his evidence, the short brother offers fairly
legitimate proof of his assertion, but his pronouncements at the end of the
play tarnish his credibility. |
C nova |
12:15 – 13:15 |
16 |
|
115. |
Rebounding Hail (***) A girl shares a room piled
high with books with a companion voice who guides her as she opens the books
the action comes alive on stage. This
is a wonderful premise, and some of the choices of books contribute in
multiple ways to the plot. With a
better choice of books, and sources for the protagonists this could be much
more thought provoking and witty. |
Underbelly Cowgate |
11:20 -12:20 |
14 |
|
116. |
The Gospel According to
Jesus, Queen of Heaven (***) The transgender playwright
Jo Clifford preaches the gospel of acceptance and love. This is a quiet church service that settles
the soul. We even had communion! |
Summerhall |
10:45 – 11:35 |
27 |
|
117. |
Leftovers (***) This piece has a newlywed
wife’s fears ruin her life for years to come when her husband does not return
from war. There are some very nice
dances making use of a bed, and the early interactions with her husband and wife
are rich. The finally twist really
confused things, and hurt the play. |
Zoo |
19:30 – 20:30 |
28 |
|
118. |
La Ronde (***) We are presented with a
series of ten short scenes of pairs of lovers of different social positions
having sex that has one lover of each pair moving into the next scene until
we return to the unrepeated lover in the first pair appears in the last
scene. Though the same two actors play
the lovers in all the scenes, their roles explore a wide variety of marital
and economic standing which highlighted the thesis that sex crosses all
boundaries. While I appreciated the
concept, I must admit that I appreciated the beauty and sexiness of the
actress in the soft porn nude staging even more. |
C nova |
22:05 – 23:15 |
16 |
|
119. |
Our Ladies of Perpetual
Succour (***) Six 16-year old girls from
Oban start by rehearing a beautiful choir piece at the Edinburgh Choir
competition, but then doffed their uniforms to reveal sexy clothes and go on
adventures of drinking and clubbing.
There is mostly drama, a little comedy, and rock and roll mixed in
just the right proportions that would make this a very good show for many
people. However, their thick accents
hindered my understanding of much of their speech, and all of their lyrics. |
Traverse Theatre |
Varies |
19 |
|
120. |
Flossy and Boo’s Curiosity
Shop (***) This family show has two
women telling zany tales and singing ditties as well as gentle audience
participation. The women try to keep
the show entertaining for children by maintaining a fast pace with a
frequently changing variety of acts.
The three-year old next to next to me was rapt about half the time,
and otherwise had a delightful time playing with her theatre chair—such is
the life of a children’s entertainer. |
Bedlam Theatre |
13:30 – 14:30 |
15 |
|
121. |
Cell (***) Three puppeteers control a
¾ size man who learns that he has ALS, the same disease that Stephen Hawkings
has. This quiet, slow piece often
warmed my heart, but the awkward shadow puppetry interludes lacked the same quality. I found his efforts to make a home for a
goldfish particularly endearing. |
Underbelly Cowgate |
16:35 – 17:35 |
14 |
|
122. |
Bruce (***) With two black clothed
puppeteers, a single block shaped puppet portrays all of the characters in a
story of an inept cop who has life that includes riding wooing a woman,
riding in a space ship, and then taking advantage of time travel to
reconstruct his own life. This is fun
to watch, and well performed. The
storyline has a nice circularity where earlier events in the show are explained
in the context of future efforts. |
Underbelly Cowgate |
15:15 – 16:15 |
9 |
|
123. |
Willie and Sebastian (***) Willie is an old theatre
producer who pines for the woman he lost and now prefers his close friend,
and bon vivant, Sebastian. There are
many fine interactions among the three here, but Willie’s initial
presentation of his barely clad penis inches from the face of a woman in the
front row was way too rude for me. I
should note that the three actors, Andy Gray, Grant Stott, and Michelle
Gallagher are well liked celebrities of the Brits, and they seemed to charm
the audience. |
Gilded Balloon |
20:15 – 21:15 |
13 |
|
124. |
Electric Dreams (***) Three librarians assisted a
woman trying to reconstruct her life after she discovered she part of a series
of experiments involving electroshock therapy. The horror of the real Canadian
experiments, their funding by the CIA, and the CIA’s use of the techniques
for interrogation gives the whole piece tremendous power. However, it is substantially weakened when
the woman tries to expand the CIAs prescription for shock and awe to a
conspiracy theory about the recent economic collapse. |
Pleasance Dome |
15:50 – 16:50 |
18 |
|
125. |
Eating Seals and Seagull’s
Eggs (***) In 1953, the Irish
government decided to evacuate the entire population from the Blasket
Islands, and among them was Peig Sayers who authored a much hated compulsory
Irish text, Peig. Photos, excerpts from official documents,
and lines from Peig projected on
the screen provide a sense of place and time.
It was a hard life for the islanders, and even Sayers was illiterate,
and had her brother write down her tales. |
Pleasance Courtyard |
13:05 – 14:10 |
28 |
|
126. |
The Year of the Hare (***) A Finnish man is fired and
his wife leaves him on the same day so he heads north and takes on a injured
rabbit as a companion. His search for
happiness takes him many places, but he and we find little insight. The final act, when he seemingly has
transformed comes out of nowhere, and made little sense to me. |
Pleasance Dome |
18:45 – 20:00 |
13 |
|
127. |
The Game’s Afoot. An Encounter with Sherlock Holmes and
Arthur Conan Doyle (***) The author David Stuart
Davies provided a biography of Doyle as it related to Sherlock Holmes by
reading from his prepared notes.
Though he did provide some information that was new to me, most of the lecture seemed a
review. I did find it interesting that
Doyle and Oscar Wilde dined together with the publisher of “Strand Magazine,”
and that Sherlock’s deductive style may have been based on his medical school
instructor, Dr. Joseph Bell. |
Arthur Conan Doyle Centre |
19:30 – 20:30 |
12 |
|
128. |
Sleep Trees: Mafia? (***) This comedy has a young man
trying to join his two older brothers in the Mafia, but first he must
successfully commit a crime. The three
actors can be fun to watch, and have a talented rock trio providing an upbeat
score. This is a good show that is
full of lighthearted energy that just didn’t resonate with me. |
Pleasance Courtyard |
17:00 – 18:00 |
5 |
|
129. |
Cheque Please (***) A depressed waitress comments
on her feelings and thoughts as she works, meets friends, and goes to a
counseling group. She brings her
darkness everywhere though she tries to hide it, and she shows no change
throughout the play. I guess her
feeling that life is, and will always be, difficult was what the play wanted
to convey, and it achieved its goal. |
Zoo |
11:00 – 11:50 |
29 |
|
130. |
Cartography (***) A young woman who loves
maps has a weak heart that we know gives her only four years to live. This devised show uses string across the
audience and ladders to convey travel and cartographic trigonometry. I am getting tired of the use of poorly
played ukuleles to attempt add a sense of fun at the expense of musicality |
C nova |
12:00 – 12:50 |
30 |
|
131. |
Institute (***) This big production has two
file clerks working with cameras watching their every move, and alarm
sounding whenever they make an inappropriate move. As more people became involved the play
became less understandable, even for Tim.
One notable dance by the two men had them repeatedly intertwine in the
most loving way. |
Pleasance Courtyard |
13:00 – 14:20 |
13 |
|
132. |
The Jennifer
Tremblay Trilogy Part III: The
Deliverance (***) A woman tries to get her
brother to visit their dying mother, and relives the events that led to his
estrangement. While the other two
parts of the trilogy used the woman’s mother and grandmother as a bridging
thread, this story is defined by men, specifically her mothers’ husbands and,
by extension, her brother. As the men
came to forefront, I realized that virtually all of the Trilogy’s significant
men were defined as abusive and self-centered, and that jaundiced view
diminishes the whole, and particularly this play. |
Assembly Roxy |
14:00 – 15:00 |
9 |
|
133. |
Parlour Games
(***) It is a dark
and stormy night when the lights go out, and three young siblings create
almost silent plays in the style of 1920s silent films. The simple plays, and their interactions
seemed appropriate for 4, 11, and 13 year old children, but the play did seem
too long. They used a wide range of
techniques with flashlights to great effect. |
Zoo |
18:30 – 19:25 |
31 |
|
134. |
Knowledge and a
Girl (***) Snow White
resents her stepmother who is the infertile queen who revels in her beauty
while either flirting with or seducing every man she meets. Everything of the traditional tale is here,
but each has a black twist, including the seven dwarfs repeatedly raping Snow
White. The sadism of the king,
particularly the repeated blinding of the dwarves with a hot poker, fit the
dark interpretation but contributed little. |
C too |
18:15 – 19:20 |
15 |
|
135. |
Disorder (***) A mother meets
her seemingly estranged son, and relives the long manic section and then long
depressive section of her life. I was
fine with her bipolar disease being represented by an actor, but the minimal
interactions with her caring husband, and their unexplained financial plight
really hurt. Also missing was any
explanation of what even precipitated her being committed. |
C nova |
14:30 – 15:40 |
30 |
|
136. |
Chicken (***) In a small
state in a future divided England we watch a family that chose to work in a
chicken processing plant instead of a bicycle factory. This dark play fails in its effort to mix
dystopia, and magic into a satisfying whole.
The vision of the daughter as a witch who empathizes with the
onslaught of chickens, a la Hitchcock’s “Birds”, just didn’t work for me. |
Summerhall |
17:05 – 18:05 |
10 |
|
137. |
Some People Talk About
Violence (***) Audience members had
envelopes to the four actors to determine their roles in a story about a young
woman who watches “Big Bang Theory” all day while her mother frets, her
brother feels compelled to leave his lover in Australia to return to help his
family, and a narrator acts as compere.
The stories of each of their frustrations are compelling, but it is
constantly interrupted by antics such as a game of slap hands, improv free
association, and even dance numbers.
If the time allotted to these interruptions been used to explore the
family interacting this might have been an excellent play. |
Summerhall |
10:40 – 11:35 |
10 |
|
138. |
The Rape of Lucrece (***) Gerard Logan performs
Shakespeare’s narrative poem about the rape of a Roman general’s wife by his
close friend. Logan does a fine job
with the beautifully written work, but it was just too long for me to handle
without a break. Next time I’ll have a
big cup of coffee before attempting it. |
Assembly Hall |
16:30 – 17:30 |
7 |
|
139. |
The Letter: To be or to MBE (***) The dancer Jonzi D plays
himself and others as he learns that he has been offered to an MBE. While he was initially excited, the
responses from his friends and family were wide ranging, though probably no
in hip-hop rhyme as he portrayed them.
The section involving a drug dealer was confusing, but his family
Christmas dinner with his matriarch sister provided a perfect climax. |
Assembly George Square |
18:10 – 19:00 |
28 |
|
140. |
Oh Hello! (***) An actor plays Charles
Hawtrey, a star of the “Carry On” film series, who recounts his drunken life
as a flamboyant gay man. This play
suffers from concentrating at least of a third of its time on the
unremarkable years of alcoholic degradation after he left the series at the
expense of spending anytime on his long, remarkable career before the
series. Though the “Carry On” fan
seated next to me enjoyed the many references to the series’ stars, he too
left disappointed. |
Assembly Hall |
13:40 – 14:55 |
7 |
|
141. |
A + E (***) This play alternates
between two storylines: 1) three young women are in A + E waiting to hear the
outcome of their friend falling and breaking her neck; and 2) the meetings
before the fall of that woman and her boyfriend. The interactions between the three flawed
women were catty and unremarkable, but the other story was full of creative
wordplay. I think that the final scene
was supposed to provide clarification, but it did not for me. |
Pleasance Courtyard |
12:15 – 13:15 |
27 |
|
142. |
Traverse Breakfast Plays:
How Could You Slap a Girl? (***) This reading of a play has
a young fellow and his boss rob a woman who has many stories to tell. Though the men robbed her, she is the
dishonest one. The young man’s story
about his girlfriend seems contradictory when it was not supposed to be. |
Traverse |
9:00 – 9:45 |
25 |
|
143. |
Swing By Around 8 (***) To try out swinging a couple
invite another couple for the evening who a friend recommended, but they are
not sure the guests are there for swinging.
The situation of subtly trying to discover if guests are into swinging
would be a rich source of comedy, but that meant that the motivation of the
guests had to remain hidden from us too, and that left a big hole in the
play. A truth telling drinking game
works well, but it left me wondering at the source of the antipathy between
the two guests. |
C nova |
20:15 – 21:10 |
16 |
|
144. |
Bump (***) A teacher who doesn’t like
children and spends her time doing her nails rear ends an unemployed fellow,
and they sort of hit it off. The antic
montages of activity are well choreographed, but their real time vignettes
reveal a consistent mismatch that was not reflected in the finale. In comparison to his needy incompetence she
seemed too accomplished to explain her interest in him. |
Gilded Balloon at Pleasance
Dome |
11:00 – 11:50 |
16 |
|
145. |
Broken Windows (***) Caitlin Ince interviewed
five young women about gender bias, and now presents their words verbatim in
character as well as short songs based on each of her impressions. The recreation of the interviews worked
well, but the songs were weak in all of their facets. I felt that the array of unused objects strewn
around the floor should have been replaced with the seven props she actually
used. |
Pleasance Courtyard |
13:30 – 14:30 |
27 |
|
146. |
Richard Parker (***) On a ship, a man obsessed
with coincidence accosts a fellow with the same name as his. The acting, particularly by the obsessed
man is great, but the coincidences cited are often ones I had heard
before. The playwright was faced with
portraying an extended time on a life raft, and ended up making the play feel
over long. |
C nova |
22:50 – 23:50 |
9 |
|
147. |
A Very British Childhood
(***) An idyllic 1950s home falls
apart as the events in a house in the woods are revealed. The initial scene is a great match to the
Dick and Jane books of early grammar school, and the plot twists are well
conceived. Though, somehow, this show
was only memorable when I read another review of it. |
Pleasance Dome |
11:45 – 12:45 |
21 |
|
148. |
The Hideout (***) Aphrodite, Hades, and
Dionysus run a 1920s night club, and provide a silly rendition of the story
of the Minotaur. Where there are a few
well done parts, the bulk felt like an amateur show with mediocre script,
dancing, and singing. The idea of two
tap dancers being the minotaur was fun though. |
C nova |
13:20 – 14:20 |
30 |
|
149. |
Satan Speaks: ‘Why I Don’t
Exist’ (***) Satan takes over the body
of an actor to argue why people’s view of him is paradoxical. The actor seems a nice fellow, and the
citations from the Bible are well chosen, but the whole thing is slight. It reminded me of my teenage arguments with
a pastor about the obvious inconsistencies in the Bible. |
Gilded Balloon Teviot |
22:30 – 23:30 |
7 |
|
150. |
Jekyll (***) An inspirational speaker
who relies on interrogation affects people’s lives both near and far. Her intense questioning seemed aggressive
but effective, and her acolyte’s progress appropriate, but her unproductive
biographer contributed little to the story.
The final meeting between the acolyte and her mentor was as revealing
as it was short. |
C Chambers Street |
21:10 - |
5 |
|
151. |
The Remnants: As
Thyself (***) Start from an analysis of a
painting of Narcissus, this work is divided into several reappearing
stories. As with the other Remnants
production, a scientist and his female companion have two different views of
the events; his is analytic and unfeeling, and hers is more approachable and
socially aware. The pas de deux
between a surprisingly adroit large man and a slight woman had them display a
complex mix of aggression and support. |
C nova |
19:30 – 20:20 |
22 |
|
152. |
Ada (***) As a computer science
lecturer, I was looking forward to this biography of the first computer
programmer, Ada Lovelace. However,
from the initial flawed description of an algorithm to the inexplicable
repetition of scenes this show came across as a bit slipshod. They had a video of a replica of Babbage’s
computer, but for some reason, it was placed as a unlabeled backdrop when
they did provide captions for other, less relevant, machines. |
Bedlam Theatre |
15:00 – 16:00 |
16 |
|
153. |
Traverse Breakfast Plays:
The Walt Disney Project (***) In 2056, three Quebec
rebels are trying to devise a plan to revive the cryogenically preserved Walt
Disney to use his winning smile to convince the people of Quebec to build a
utopian city. The Walt Disney
character has an odd role as he is the only person that is not real, but he
provides criticism of their fantastical plan.
It is hard to imagine this would grow to a full size play |
Traverse Theatre |
9:00 – 9:45 |
30 |
|
154. |
Fable (***) After supposedly chatting
on a dating site, a woman with a weak heart travels north to meet a Scottish
poet/woodsman. Both are looking for
something beyond themselves, and their searches cross, but this feels like a
sparse play. The looped guitar music was
too loud for the reverberating Anatomy Lecture Theatre. |
Summerhall |
18:30 – 19:30 |
29 |
|
155. |
CUT (***) A flight attendant thinks a
man is stalking her from being a passenger on her jet to the subway, and even
to her home. The play takes place in
special room that can be made pitch black, and certainly adds an air of disquiet
to the piece. Despite this physical
advantage, the show is quite disappointing because it never thrills in the
way that the ads leads one to believe. |
Underbelly George Square |
18:00 – 19:05 |
7 |
|
156. |
Big Bite Size Breakfast
Show (Menu 1) (***) The five mini-plays have: four
rock festival attendees trying collapse a tent, a fellow’s opinion of a woman
transforming over years, a clingy woman repeatedly adapting to a philandering
date, a deluded wife trying to convince her husband to make a horrific
commitment, and a ten-minute “Pride and Prejudice.” Unlike previous years I found few
characters sincere enough to be worthy of my attention or caring. Only the girl who arranged the festival
tent, and the transformed fellow touched me, and even he had to overcome an
irrelevant of how he looked sleeping. |
Pleasance Dome |
10:30 – 11:30 |
5 |
|
157. |
Traverse Breakfast Plays:
No Desert Roses (***) This Egyptian play has the
playwright self-consciously talking to the Traverse audience as well as three
characters sitting behind her. The
African immigrant character seemed to be there to highlight cultural
differences, the old woman spoke of her loves and quick boredom, and the
third seemed simply out of place and of little use. On the whole, it felt quite fragmented with
little to offer. |
Traverse Theatre |
9:00 – 9:45 |
29 |
|
158. |
Some Thing New (***) Five actors guide the
audience through word and drawing tasks while occasionally interacting among
themselves. This odd mix of workshop
and play has its moments, but the obvious artificiality of our guides
degrades all aspects of the work. It
may be worthwhile to receive a critique from an art professor, but there is
little gained from a poser’s commentary, and when a supposed art professor
take umbrage of another actor’s comments it crosses the fourth wall too many
times to serve any useful purpose. |
C nova |
13:30 – 14:20 |
16 |
|
159. |
Traverse Breakfast Plays:
Ctrl-Z (***) A family is stuck in
traffic while their son is in a hospital bed so drugged that he is constantly
repeating the same song. In the UNIX computer
operating system, pressing the Ctrl and Z keys at the same time causes the
current program to be suspended (not terminated), and allows it to be
continued later. In both settings, the people’s lives are essentially
suspended, but the whole play just seems too slow moving to be of much
interest. |
Traverse Theatre |
9:00 – 9:45 |
27 |
|
160. |
Traverse Breakfast
Plays: The Elephant Speaks Ukrainian
(***) A very short play about a
woman in modern Ukraine who must deal with her daughter and lover while
waiting for her husband to return from the war with the rebels. |
Traverse Theatre |
9:00 – 9:45 |
26 |
|
161. |
Waking Beauty (***) This version of “Sleeping
Beauty” has the girl fall sick because of a woman who maybe a witch. The story suffers from having the same
actress playing both the narrator and “witch” entering and leaving the room
frequently without a clear delineation of which role she is playing until she
speaks for a while. The choice of
having a sudden back story of the girl and the “witch” instead of presenting
the story in chronological order also weakens the power of the piece. |
C nova |
18:30 -19:20 |
8 |
|
162. |
Traverse Breakfast Plays:
Plays by Berkun Oya This show had two Turkish
plays: 1) at a beach a mother laments to another woman, who she slowly
mistakes for year daughter, that her absent son has chosen a Kurdish
girlfriend; and 2) a man allows a young demonstrator running from the police
to take refuge in his apartment. Both
plays had their moments, but I think they relied on knowledge of Turkish
current events for some of their power. |
Traverse Theatre |
9:00 – 9:45 |
28 |
|
163. |
Unmythable (***) Jason and the Argonauts
overarches an abridged version of many Greek myths. Each story was too short to be worth
anything. Though I did like a scene
where three men try to stay quiet in the Trojan Horse. |
Pleasance Dome |
14:40 – 15:45 |
19 |
|
164. |
Lennon: Through a Glass
Onion (***) John Waters on vocals and
guitar accompanied by Stewart D’Arrietta on piano mixes events from John
Lennon’s life with mediocre interpretations of his songs. |
Assembly Hall |
22:30 – 23:35 |
20 |
|
165. |
The Turn of the Screw (***) We hear the tale of a new
governess, her two charges, a mysterious house, and an impending death. Was it the warm room, late night, glass of wine,
or the telling that just failed to keep my attention? I know that the beginning moved slowly and
whenever I returned there was nothing there to keep my interest for
long. |
Assembly Hall |
21:40 – 22:40 |
10 |
|
166. |
Am I Dead Yet (***) This is another play that
left little for me to remember. There
were two policeman looking for parts of a man hit by a train who come upon a
his severed head, and a CPR demonstration, but the rest is a blank. |
Traverse |
23:15 – 0:15 |
22 |
|
167. |
My Name is Saoirse (***) A naïve young Irish woman
discovers sex and alcohol on the same night, and then must deal with the
ensuing pregnancy. Each year there is
a play that I just cannot remember, and this it. I know the actress did fine, it is just
that amid all the plays I have seen, this one was easily forgotten by me. |
Assembly Hall |
12:15 – 13:15 |
7 |
|
168. |
Paintings and Cake (***) Sorry folks, but I had
completely forgotten this play by the next day. Since I am not tired, nor was I, I suppose
that is my review. This is an easily forgotten
play with nothing good or bad to make it remarkable. |
C nova |
17:00 – 18:00 |
15 |
|
169. |
The Emperor of America
(***) This musical is set in the
San Francisco of the 1850s Gold Rush with the real life failed businessman
who became Emperor Norton of America, and Protector of Mexico as its
touchstone. As someone who grew up in
a suburb of San Francisco, I did enjoy revisiting the tales of the Barbary
Coast and its shanghai bars, but the story seemed diffuse. While everyone else seemed to master a
frontier accent, I found Mark Twain speaking with a French accent
particularly disconcerting and inexplicable. |
C too |
21:15 – 22:25 |
12 |
|
170. |
The Accidental Adventures
of Sherlock Holmes (***) Three actors play the
traditional characters as Holmes unknowingly kills a potential client with
the backswing of his golf club, and then must find the culprit. Last day of the Fringe, I’m rested, and I
still nodded off during this piece. It
was fun to see Sherlock played by a short woman. |
C Chamber St. |
15:45 – 16:45 |
31 |
|
171. |
The Titanic Orchestra (***) Four bums wait at an
abandoned rail station with the intent of boarding a train that has stopped,
and stealing a random suitcase. The
story takes a turn toward the fantastic when a box is delivered that contains
a fellow who magically provides money and wine. As the box takes on magical properties the
whole story becomes a muddle. |
Pleasance Courtyard |
17:25 – 18:35 |
18 |
|
172. |
When Blair had Bush and
Bunga (***) Tony Blair, Silvio
Berlusconi, George Bush, and their advisors meet at a resort to discuss the
invasion of Iraq. This silly comedy
has Blair and his wife inordinately subservient to their advisors, Berlusconi
constantly chasing women, and Bush portrayed as a dumb, drunk hawk. Except for Bush’s drinking each portrayal
had elements of truth, but they had been push to such absurd levels that I,
unlike the bulk of the audience, quickly found this long farce a bore. |
Pleasance Courtyard |
19:00 – 20:30 |
18 |
|
173. |
Be Better (**) An incompetent acolyte is
both encouraged and belittled by her inspirational idol during their
presentations. Both women fit their
molds perfectly, but I had real trouble laughing at the incompetence of the
girl because of the sincerity she conveyed and the subtleness of her mistakes. The latter part of the play became truly
and incomprehensible. |
Bedlam Theatre |
13:30 – 14:25 |
24 |
|
174. |
The Strange Friendship of
Arthur Conan Doyle and Harry Houdini (**) This boring lecture had a
video of an interview of Doyle from the 1930s talking about spiritualism, and
a dull recording of a séance attended by the speaker. The most interesting thing was a reprint of
a 1931 article in Hearst’s International Cosmpolitan in which Conan Doyle was
interviewed. |
Arthur Conan Doyle Centre |
15:30 – 16:30 |
25 |
|
175. |
Sex Rated G (**) A woman accompanied by
taped music and a slide show responds to sexual words on the screen that all
begin with the letter G. Other than
occasional slide with some interesting statistics, most of the images and
songs have little to offer. The good
natured actress has little range, and her monotonous ditties left the
audience so unimpressed they never clapped after each one. |
Gilded Balloon Teviot |
13:45- 14:45 |
18 |
|
176. |
Current Location (**) Four women in a choir live
near a town where a recent event may be an omen that the town will be
destroyed, but they do not believe it.
This piece has each of the four arguing with another member to no
effect. In the end, it all made no
sense to me. |
Summerhall |
10:30 – 11:30 |
26 |
|
177. |
Picasso Stole the Mona Lisa
(**) The poet Guillaume
Apollinaire wakes to find the Mona Lisa on an easel in his Parisian
apartment. As he is by his friend
Picasso, and his nosey neighbor this quickly becomes a farce of little value. At one point during a series of blackouts,
the neighbor, who is trying to escape the two men, is shown able to escape,
but instead is tugging on the poet’s pants for no reason. |
C nova |
20:50 – 21:50 |
24 |
|
178. |
Light Boxes (**) A family in a village must
deal with February, a month/person combination, that has banned flight and
made their town permanently cold and depressed. This is one of those plays that seemed like
it lay at the edge of my comprehension because some small parts made sense,
in the end, it was just an inexplicable mess as a whole. While waging war with February the use of
boiling water to create paths in the snow made sense, but what gave rise to
the later incredibly invasive and deadly moss? |
Summerhall |
19:15 – 20:35 |
17 |
|
179. |
Donald Does Dusty (**) Diana Torr presents a
homage to gay brother who was a minor singer and actor who idolized Dusty
Springfield. She combined lip syncing
Springfield songs, video clips of her
TV shows in which her brother appeared in the chorus, and even film of his
funeral. Though she clearly cares for
him still, the whole show seemed both amateurish and self-centered, and
offered little to me. |
Summerhall |
19:35 – 20:35 |
26 |
|
180. |
Margaret Thatcher Queen of
Soho (**) A transvestite Margaret
Thatcher and two aides, in a cabaret style, review her time as prime minister
with particular attention to Section 28 that prevented local authorities from
promoting homosexuality. I quickly
grew tired of the loud, broad, Thatcher with her constant mugging. As an American most of the political
references were lost on me, though a majority of the audience had a good
time. |
Assembly George Square |
21:00 – 22:10 |
18 |
|
181. |
Daze of My Life (**) A theater major presents a
solo show about her life that she developed for her University of Southern
California course on solo shows.
Though she initially asserts that she is a “people pleaser,” this
driven, talented woman proceeds to give a chronological montage of her life’s
events with little evidence for her thesis.
The biggest problem for me was discerning which character was speaking
because she in virtually the same voice, albeit sometimes Spanish, throughout
the play. |
Paradise in the Vault |
10:15 – 11:15 |
15 |
|
182. |
ErictheFred (**) A silent, dour, man
prepares for his clown act, and then spends much of his time chasing
butterflies at the end of poles, and disentangling himself. This is a slow, sad tale that would work
better in a small venue, but his staging required a more traditional room
with wings. When he started by
spending seemingly five minutes applying his make-up, he set a boring tone
that he evidently wanted to keep reinforcing throughout the play. |
Assembly Roxy |
21:45 – 22:40 |
13 |
|
183. |
Marriage (**) In Victorian England, with
the help of a stinking matchmaker, four badly flawed men try to woo the hand
of an incompetent young woman. Every
character is so one-dimensional that I found that I was just rooting for the
play to end. For instance, after the
woman has a decidedly awkward private conversation with the protagonist that
is limited to twenty words, she regales her aunt with the joy and love
engender by it. |
Assembly George Square |
14:00 – 15:10 |
12 |
|
184. |
Festivus (**) Two young couples share
drugs, confidences, and indiscretions at an overnight rock festival. This play explores all the possible combinations
of a lout, a smart manipulator, a flighty irresponsible girl, and a
gregarious flirt while saying little of value. I imagine that it resonates with the
experiences of many in the audience, but I’ve grown tired of seeing the same
old twenty-something foolishness on display with nothing new except the
setting. |
C nova |
19:30 – 20:30 |
8 |
|
185. |
I’m Not Here Right Now (**) A fellow sits along side
the stage and narrates the story of a professor who must deal with peers that
doubter her sightings of an abominable snowman, and a loving outdoorsman
father who may not be so perfect. She
acts well, and he reads well, but I don’t come to a play to have it read to
me. The text does do a good job of
conveying her deep connection with the outdoors though. |
Summerhall |
18:25 – 19:30 |
10 |
|
186. |
Tribute Acts (**) Two young women explore
their estrangement from their fathers through video interviews of the fathers
of each other. They realized their
vision well, but it was not enough to remove the feeling that this is a piece
by two people who spent most of their preparation thinking about themselves
instead of the audience. They
confirmed this by ending the show with a tribute to their favorite YouTube
clip of Bill Clinton playing a saxophone which had little relevance to the
rest of the show. |
Assembly Roxy |
14:50 – 15:50 |
8 |
|
187. |
S.E.N (**) In a detention classroom, a
teacher must manage a manic teenager, and a quiet Muslim girl. I did not have a problem with the acting, but
I hated the idea that such an incompetent teacher would ever still have a
steady job. While a substitute teacher
can have real problems with class discipline, watching a supposed permanent
teacher be so unprofessional reeked of a playwright’s fantasy. |
Bedlam Theatre |
21:30 – 22:30 |
9 |
|
188. |
Stuart Bowden: Wilting in
Reverse (**) Bowden looped music,
awkward dancing, repeated audience participation, and low production values
in general to tell the story of a colonist on a dry planet who sabotages the
spaceship so he can stay with the woman he likes. Bowden establishes the silly, humor of the
inept from the beginning by entering the dark set and immediately running
into a chair, and then grumbling about the strategic chair being left
there, It was an hour of demonstrating
just how bad a show can be if that is the goal of the performer. |
Underbelly Cowgate |
20:10 – 21:10 |
10 |
|
189. |
Phantasmagoria (*) The audience is ushered
into a small darkened room to hear a rendition of Lewis Carroll’s poem about
a ghost discussing the role of ghosts in the world. While the two ushers attempt to maintain
decorum and move props as needed, the orator unknowingly provided a
demonstration of acting excess. He
alternated between whispers too quiet to be heard, and bellowing so loud that
in the small room he was unintelligible. |
C nova |
Varies |
23 |
I am a 62-year
old Computer Science lecturer from the University of California in Davis who
thinks even a bad play is better than no play at all. I have been to the Fringe eleven times
before. Twelve years ago, after two
weeks touring France, my wife and I spent nine days of our honeymoon at the
Fringe. We shared 45 plays, and I
attended ten other events besides. In
2005, I fulfilled a dream of seeing an entire Fringe Festival. Since then, I have been here for the whole
Fringe every year except 2007. I have
learned to devote most days to only one venue to maximize the number of
performances I can see. I expect this
year to be similar to last—many performances, and many new friends.
After attending
more than 1000 performances, I have a much better idea of my biases and
prejudices in the role of a critic. To
limit my analyzing shows during their performances as much as possible, I have
intentionally avoided any training in criticism and the dramatic arts, both
formal and informal. I find that I
prefer fact to fiction, innovation to repetition, coherence to creativity, the
concrete to the symbolic, and cleverness to depth. I realize that many of these are antithetical
to the spirit of the Fringe, but I cannot deny my nature. In particular, I just do not like shows that
push the bounds of creativity beyond my ability to make sense of them. Because I choose to fill time slots with
whatever is available, I still expose myself to such shows, and do not
mind. However, I do feel a little guilty
giving a low rating to a show on which a company has worked so hard, and with
such commitment. Nevertheless, I
envision that that is my role—to accurately report my enjoyment so that others
may better use my ratings. In all but a
very few cases, I admire the effort of each company, and wish them well.
