Archive for August, 2024
Man of War: The Secret Life of Nadezhda Durova
★★★★☆ Powerful
With four actors sharing the title role, Man of War: The Secret Life of Nadezhda Durova from Acting Coach Scotland is a compelling, ensemble-driven telling of the life of a man, who was a woman; a person, who was a soldier; putting aside all personal comforts for their country’s good.
Sam Blythe: Method in my Madness
★★★☆☆ Unresolved
A disyllabic clown with a trunk of tricks puts on a red nose and transforms into Hamlet, Prince of Denmark— or perhaps he was Hamlet all along? Sam Blythe: Method in my Madness is an experimental one-man Hamlet that ultimately creates more questions than it answers.
Book Festival 2024 round-up 1
Paul Bright re-excavated, Perambulations of a Justified Sinner, Lone Tree
The Edinburgh International Book Festival has moved home again for 2024, to its new (permanent) home at the Edinburgh Futures Institute, part of the Quartermile development at the old Infirmary.
Caged: The True Story of Isabella MacDuff
★★★★☆ Commanding
Confined behind bars before her audience, Isabella MacDuff takes to the stage to tell her own story in Caged, written and directed by Colette Swan for Pigeon Cote Productions.
She Burns
★★★★★ Her noblest wark
She Burns is a feminist reworking of the story of Scotland’s very own Bard, in an enlightening and entertaining show, playing for just six performances across the fringe at Johnnie Walker Princes Street.
Animate Lands: A Celtic Myth Cycle
★★★★☆ Traditional
After selling out the Scottish Storytelling Centre in 2022, Animate Lands: A Celtic Myth Cycle returns to the venue for the Fringe. Storyteller Dougie Mackay accompanied by multi-instrumentalist Freya Rae, takes us on a poetic journey through traditional Scottish tales and wilderness.
PALS
★★★★☆ Unstoppable
Filled with banter and the odd Gaelic phrase, PALS at the Gilded Balloon Patter House is a brilliant adventure-comedy that will have you laughing one minute and holding back tears the next.
Singing Willows
★★★☆☆ Whimsical
Singing Willows at the French Institute is the brainchild of Alexandra Borghino, a French artist who has adapted her book of the same name into bilingual tunes for wee ones, to teach French and English through songs and pictures.
Antonio’s Revenge
★★☆☆☆ Unfathomable
Antonio’s Revenge is a definite oddity, not made any less strange by its staging by Edinburgh/New Zealand company Half Trick Theatre at C alto on even dates of the Fringe only.
Hamstrung
★★★★☆ Method in’t
“A fellow of infinite jest,” is how Shakespeare introduced deceased court jester Yorick, but the Yorick of George Rennie’s Hamstrung is a being as existential as the appearance of his skull at a pivotal moment in Hamlet’s crisis deserves.
