Five shows to see at the Edinburgh Fringe, vol. 5
An experimental Scottish-Canadian musical, a debut play about friendship, a comedy show about Jimmy Connors, and more. Plus: news and views on the festival elsewhere.
Hello, and welcome to The Crush Bar, a Substack about theatre written by me, Fergus Morgan.
This newsletter is the fifth in a series of issues focusing on the Edinburgh Fringe, which runs throughout August. Each one will contain a brief round-up of updates from the festival, plus recommendations for five shows to see. Regular newsletters will resume in September.
There is a couple of things you can do to help me keep this newsletter and its coverage of fringe theatre going. Firstly, you can share it far and wide, forward it to anyone you think might be interested, and encourage them to subscribe. And secondly, you can become a paid supporter of The Crush Bar - it’s £50/year or £5/month - via the button below. Thanks.
The festival is three days away…
Producer Ellie Keel, who is bringing Daisy Hall’s Bellringers to the Paines Plough Roundabout, has written about why the Edinburgh Fringe remains so significant for the theatre industry, and whether that will change under Labour, in The Stage.
“If there were more alternatives – by which I mean theatres, festivals and subsidised opportunities to put on shows and find audiences for them – I do not think that so many of us (producers) would be trudging to the Scottish capital every summer to gamble the equivalent of a house deposit.”
Interviews with artists at the festival are everywhere. Here is me interviewing Janie Dee in The Stage. Here is Joyce McMillan interviewing Stef Smith in The Scotsman. Here is Alex Wood interviewing Jake Roche for WhatsOnStage. Here is Mike Wade interviewing Andy Yearly in The Times.
And Fringe Society chief executive Shona McCarthy has also been interviewed by Wade in The Times. She discusses funding, accommodation, and more.
“The arts industry of the world come to this city to shop. We’ve got Universal, Amazon, Netflix arriving as well as people who run theatres, and festivals worldwide, looking for new talent and new writing.”
There are several shows about grief at this year’s festival. Natasha Tripney has spoken to a few of the artists behind them in The Stage.
Editor Alex Wood and critic Sarah Crompton discuss their experiences at the Edinburgh Fringe over the years and whether it is still possible to make a name for yourself at the festival, in this episode of the WhatsOnStage podcast.
I’ve got two Substacks to recommend. Firstly, here is the Edinburgh Inquirer’s breakdown of what to expect from the festival, from bin strikes to bad weather.
Secondly, here is local writer Sarah Gonzalez Wood’s list of recommendations, which includes other stuff to do in Edinburgh in August outside the festival.
Also: Humfrey Brandes has made this handy page tracking which Fringe shows are selling out; F-Bomb Theatre has published its FemiFringe Guide to all shows “led by women and people of marginalised genders.”
Morag, You’re A Long Time Deid - ZOO Southside, 1.25pm
Claire Love Wilson is a Scottish-Canadian theatremaker and musician based in Vancouver. Together with Austrian director Peter Lorenz, she is the creator of the semi-autobiographical “queer ceilidh music-theatre experience” Morag, You’re A Long Time Deid, which runs arrives at the Edinburgh Fringe halfway through a UK tour.
Based partly on Wilson’s own life and told through an experimental, electronic blend of traditional and contemporary Celtic music, Morag, You’re A Long Time Deid focusses on Sam, a Canadian woman who inherits her Scottish grandmother Morag’s broken piano, then pieces together the mysteries of her ancestor’s love life.
Performed by Wilson and Sally Zori, the show premiered to acclaim in Vancouver in 2022, and now runs throughout the festival at ZOO Southside in a staging co-produced by An Tobar and Mull Theatre, then tours Scotland until September 10, before visiting Ireland and England. You can get tickets via the button below.
Little Deaths - Summerhall, 8.55pm
This world premiere comes from an exciting, emerging creative team. The debut play from Welsh writer Amy Powell Yeates, it is directed by Claire O’Reilly, leader of acclaimed Dublin-based company Malaprop Theatre, and features rising stars Olivia Forrest and Rosa Robson in its cast. Lighting comes from the prolific David Doyle.
It is a romcom about platonic love. Forrest, who recently appeared in Much Ado About Nothing at the National Theatre, and Robson, star of Disney+ Extraordinary, play Charlie and Debs, two women whose friendship waxes and wanes over 25 years.
Co-produced by new outfit Nuthatch Productions and established Scottish company Scissor Kick - also behind Catafalque, which runs until August 11 - Little Deaths is at Summerhall throughout the festival. You can get tickets via the button below.
Adam Riches: Jimmy – Summerhall, 9.30pm
Character comedian Adam Riches is responsible for one of my strangest experiences at the Fringe. His 2019 show The Beakington Town Hall Murders was basically a big game of Guess Who?, in which one unlucky audience member was selected as the “murderer” each night, and Riches spent the entire hour attempting to find them via a series of weird games. Once he did, he subjected them to ritualistic punishment on stage. I was selected as his unfortunate victim. He found me. He humiliated me.
Do not let that put you off going to see his latest show, though. Riches is one of the most imaginative, entertaining acts at the festival, winning the prestigious comedy award in 2011. This year, he is in the theatre section of the programme with Jimmy.
It is billed as a one-man show about US tennis legend Jimmy Connors. Whether or not that is actually what it is remains to be seen. What is for sure is that it runs at Summerhall throughout the festival, and that you can get tickets via the button below.
Do This One Thing For Me - Bedlam Theatre, 3.30pm
Jane Elias’ father, Beni, was a Sephardic Jew from Greece who survived Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen. In her solo storytelling show Do This One Thing For Me, the New York City-based actor and writer explores how Beni’s traumatic experiences affected him in later life, informed his behaviour as a father, shaped his relationship with his daughter, and continue to influence Elias’ life today, echoing down the decades.
Directed by Tracy Bersley, the show sees Elias multi-role as herself, her father, and various other characters, adapting sections of storytelling directly from an interview her father recorded for Steven Spielberg’s Shoah Foundation. It was developed after Beni’s death in 2010 – “I started asking myself more questions about my inheritance and started feeling this pressing need to keep his story alive,” Elias says – and premiered to acclaim in New York City in 2013, returning regularly until 2018.
Now, Do This One Thing For Me makes its European premiere at the Fringe, brought to the festival by producer Allison Parker, who has form in shepherding powerful productions across the Atlantic, including 2023’s 17 Minutes and 2022’s Intelligence. It runs at Bedlam Theatre all month and you can get tickets via the button below.
This is promotional content.
Elizabeth I: In Her Own Words - theSpace @ Surgeon’s Hall, 1.55pm
Nebraska-based historian and playwright Carole Levin has spent her career studying Elizabeth I and the tumultuous Tudor world she defined. Now, she has poured her expertise into an extraordinary new play exploring the Virgin Queen through verbatim extracts from her letters, interwoven with passages from Shakespeare.
“It’s kind of a memory play,” Levin says. “It starts with Elizabeth at the end of her reign, preparing to go to bed and reflecting on her life. Then, it dives through it all, from the Earl Of Essex’s rebellion, to her victory over the Armada, to her romantic friendship with Robert Dudley, to her relationship with Mary Stewart. By the end, we get to know Elizabeth the Queen, but we also get to know Elizabeth the woman, too.”
Directed by Lynn Nichols, a veteran of Colorado Shakespeare Festival, and starring Tammy Meneghini, Elizabeth I: In Her Own Words previewed in Denver and New York City, and now arrives at the Edinburgh Fringe for its European premiere, produced by Penny Cole, an established presence at the festival. It runs at theSpace @ Surgeon’s Hall for a fortnight, ending on August 17. You can get tickets via the button below.
This is promotional content.
Thanks for reading
That is it for this issue. I will be back in your inboxes on Friday with five more shows to see at the festival. If you want to get in touch about anything raised in this issue - or anything at all, really - just reply to this email or find me on Twitter, where I am @FergusMorgan.
A quick reminder of the two ways you can support The Crush Bar. You can share it and encourage others to subscribe. And you can become a paid supporter. There are currently 3145 subscribers and 103 paid supporters. You can join them using the button above.
Fergus
You’re the best!!!!!