What Awaits Me At The Edinburgh Fringe?

As I wait to hop onto my 8.55pm flight to Edinburgh, I gander at my calendar that I have managed to fill up over the past few months. After my last trip to the Fringe last year, I decided I wanted to test my limits, explore new writing. Most importantly, I wanted to challenge myself. Everyone I know acknowledges that I am passionate about new writing being showcased on mainstream platforms. It seems nowadays in order to sell out in a West End venue all you need is a relatively talented celebrity, and the said show already being based on a book/film/etc.

That is why places like the Edinburgh Fringe are so important to the theatre industry. It is a way of testing the waters or experimenting new things without the worry of masses and masses of audiences leaving a bad review on Twitter. It seems to me that if you do see something shoddy, you simply shrug it off and move on to the next one. There is no time to complain, you have just got to keep going until you find that golden nugget that will be your favourite show of the entire experience. I know last year I spent too much time telling the world the shows I hated and spent less time valuing the ones I loved. So that is why this year I am making sure that my reviews for you will be some form of positive, and if not I shall not dwell on them for too long. Those of you at the fringe this year all want to see a good show, so I shall use this platform to inform you of all the good shows you might want to have a gander at. If you are not going, I am grateful that you might want to listen to my opinions anyway.

After saving and buying a new ticket week by week, I am seeing a grand total of 14 shows within the space of 4 days. Crazy! Last year I saw 10 shows, so it is a good step up from my last trip to the cobbled streets of Edinburgh. However, most of the shows I saw were of friends from uni doing their own productions. Whilst I am seeing a number of shows this year that were made by my uni pals, I also made sure I would watch as much new writing as possible.

As preparation for this trip, I thought I would give you all an update as to what will be happening on this blog for the next few days. The plan is to do a daily blog entry and give reviews for every show I see that day. I would have loved to do a new entry for every show but there’s just no time between shows and when I get home for me to write 3-5 reviews a night. Also, it might clog up your feed! This way people can find the reviews they want and not have to sift through countless entries on this blog or my Twitter/Facebook.

I will write my list of shows that I am seeing this year here. However I did make a video on my YouTube channel of all the shows I saw last year, so if you are interested I recommend you give it a look.

FRIDAY 11TH:

• Merrily We Roll Along (with BB Theatre Productions, written by Stephen Sondheim)
• The Alchemist (devised by Caterham Rep)
• Kate If You Wanna Go Butcher (written and performed by Kate Butch)

SATURDAY 12TH:

• Shakespeare for Breakfast (devised by C Theatre)
• Dahling, You Were Marvellous (devised by Les Siege of Herons)
• Rhinoceros (directed by Murat Daltaban, adapted by Zinnie Harris)
• Meow Meow’s The Little Mermaid (directed by Michael Kantor, written by Meow Meow)
• The Shambles (devised by The Shambles, with Dead Duck Productions)

SUNDAY 13TH:

• Two (directed by David Bolwell, written by Jim Cartwright, with York DramaSoc)
• Notflix (devised by Waiting for the Call: The Improvised Musical)
• I See You – Live (written by Sam Gore)
• Tom Allen

MONDAY 14TH:

• Unexpected Electrical Nativity (written by Jared More, directed by Katie Smith, with York DramaSoc)
• The Murderous Philanthropist of Croydon Town (devised by Intrepid Fools)
• The Teeth of Haros (devised by Cowards & Kings)
• We’re All Going to Die (devised by Dead Person Productions)

So as you can see my schedule is pretty tight! I cannot wait to review these shows for you, and I hope you keep your eyes peeled by following this blog or my Twitter page for updates. Exciting times!

With love,

Carrie Mo