It's time to play festival bingo
There's trauma, tote bags and sunflower print as far as the eye can see. How many will you tick off?
Greetings from our nation’s capital where, thanks to a punishing schedule of multiple shows a day, I am running out of thoughts.
This could be down to many factors: over stimulation, lack of essential nutrients, sore bottom. Being blast-hosed constantly by other people’s ideas, then having to find my own take on them.
Wonder how that feels? To give you an insight, this week we are playing festival bingo. There will be observations, insights and a scattering of reviews, all presented in a zippy collect-them-all format that means I don’t have to pull some kind of coherent conclusion from my thrumming synapses.
Let the fun begin.
An artefact from a dead person
So many comedy, drama and fictionalised personal stories now include elements of object theatre that it’s rare to see a show that doesn’t include a plait of a dead sister’s hair or a wonky crochet discloth.
Meal deal on a park bench
Eating the healthiest thing available from Sainsbury’s instead of a £12 wrap in George Square? Pass that sweet passionfruit and mango smoothie.
A man sucking a dick and being very low-key about it
Hey, look at me (and me) casually exploring my sexuality to impress the pretty girls in the front row.
I’m a survivor
With many personal shows, it feels like the applause is for surviving, rather than making an impressive piece of work. I too am pleased that you got through your trauma. I don’t necessarily want to sit in a tent and relive it with you.
Sleeping in a cupboard
I have truly entered my Harry Potter era.
Welcome to my Ted Talk
The slideshows and bullet points format is not going anywhere. Far be it from me to disparage the list format but it can feel a bit of a lazy device to give a shambling show some shape.
Pret a Manger subscription
This £30 deal is all that stands between many critics and dehydration. Five drinks a day plus 20% off food is a solid offer when you are constantly on the go yet endlessly hanging around. Plus they have reasonably reliable wifi. And their new raspberry lemonade slaps.
The Fringe will eat itself
The city is full of artists with huge gaps between shows to fill. When they are not giving themselves alcohol poisoning or shagging the lads and lassies who work in the box office, they do this by appearing in each other’s shows. Or on their podcasts. Or in compilation shows such as Late ‘n’ Live, relocated to Gilded Balloon Patter Hoose while Teviot Row is renovated. Full disclosure - I haven’t been. I feel that those of us who can travel to Chambers Street using their bus pass should have the dignity not to bother.
I’m sweating like a bear in here
There have been some hot, humid days. Respect to performers who relive their trauma etc while competing with a giant aircon unit that shudders on and off like a Beko fridge in a studio apartment.
Show me the money
The majority of fringe shows, with their DIY ethic, forego luxuries such as set, props and costume changes. Or, in some cases, costumes. The official festival, by contrast, throws spectacle after spectacle at its audience. Animation. Sets with revolves. Wigs. It’s like going from a jumble sale straight into Harvey Nicks.
Merch creep
Badges schmadges, this year it’s about tote bags and tees. I am coveting a Paddy Daddy number to carry me water bottle and snacks. The Traverse show Batshit has some very fetching Bring Me The Axe t-shirts.
Stealing wifi
Reviewing apocalyptic climate change comedy using Ladbrokes’ network feels like a quiet act of cultural subversion.
Think of something people like and make a show about it
If you too have completely run out of ideas, simply alight on something in the culture that already has a fanbase. Or an extensive internet rabbit hole. Or just an image that people will recognise.
Make a show about that.
Harry Potter seems to have been exhausted at last but burlesque Shrek and two Gwynneth Paltrow skiing musicals have leapt in to take his place. That is before even looking at the extensive range of tribute bands sorry gig theatre homages aimed at the dad rock audience.
Reuben Kaye
Forget opening a show. That guy can work a beer garden, a distracted audience at a fundraiser or even a pavement. His chat and charm, like his eyelashes, go on for miles.
Ethical dressing
That Lucy and Yak sunflower pattern is burned onto my retinas.
A dude in an endearingly awful costume flyering his own show
Truly the spirit of the fringe is encapsulated in Shitty Mozart, a lovely young man in a flammable pile of Amazon fancy dress finery, gamely playing some kind of electric kids toy to pissed people on South Bridge on a Monday night. Next year I expect a tote bag.