Archive for August, 2021
Playing With Books – the Yellow Door
The last of this year’s Playing With Books events at the Book Festival was a singular piece. The Yellow Door was even more of a ‘work in progress’ than is usual for the strand as it is not yet even a book. I
Alan Cumming Is Not Acting His Age
★★★☆☆ Mixed bag
Given the honour of closing the Edinburgh International Festival that so nearly never happened, Alan Cumming responds with his trademark gusto and skill. Alan Cumming Is Not Acting His Age at the Old College Quad is, however, an odd combination of the delightful and the infuriating.
Playing With Books – the Long Drop
..and other recent Book Festival events
The Book Festival continues in its new home at the Edinburgh College of Art on Lauriston Place, and also continues to offer events of interest to theatre-goers.
Jack Docherty – Nothing But
★★★★☆ Oddly serious
Jack Docherty – Nothing But in the Gilded Balloon Wine Bar showcases Fringe veteran Docherty, in a piece of deceptively serious dramatic monologue. It draws on his comic roots and showbiz history, but ends up delivering something more troubling and rewarding.
Slings and Arrows
★★★★☆ Hard hitting
There is raw emotion on display in Slings and Arrows, a disabled led dram from Raised Voices at theSpace@ Surgeons Hall – but there is also humour, stagecraft and real hope.
Playhouse to reopen
Venue sets September 5 opening date
The Edinburgh Playhouse is to reopen at full capacity on Sunday 5 September 2021 – after 536 days of being dark – with two performances of Shagged, Married, Annoyed with Chris & Rosie Ramsey.
The Return of Sherlock Holmes
★★★★☆ Genuine
The Return of Sherlock Holmes is an enjoyable and convincing entertainment at Gilded Balloon Teviot and another convincing literary adaptation from Nigel Miles-Thomas and Fringe Management.
Sophia
★★★☆☆ Revealing reminder
The conflicting demands of professional ambition and personal happiness are brought into stark focus in Sophia by Frances Poet.
Save the Fringe
Year-round Fringe centre part of £7.5 million campaign
The Edinburgh Festival Fringe Society is to include a year-round fringe centre in Edinburgh as part of a £7.5 million “Save the Fringe” fundraising campaign to secure its long-term revival after Covid.
Hunt for Treasure Island
★★★☆☆ Novel hunt
In Hunt for Treasure Island, Not Cricket Productions return to the Fringe with an enjoyable romp of a treasure hunt round the New Town, seeking out the stolen manuscript of Robert Louis Stevenson’s latest novel.
