Back from a (fantastic!) week at the Fringe

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Back from a (fantastic!) week at the Fringe

Posted: 8/17/09 at 9:29pm

Just got back home from Edinburgh after a really fab (though totally exhausting) week - probably the best Fringe I've ever experienced. Saw 17 shows (1 play, 13 musicals - and 3 musicals I saw for a second time!). Out of all of them, there was only one "Turkey" (Quest) and one overblown and over-hyped (Over The Threshold). The rest were all great - and three were way beyond great (Have A Nice Life; Wolfboy; and The Great British Soap Opera).

I've reviewed 6 of them - here are some links if you're interested:
https://www.broadwayworld.com/article/Edinburgh_Festival_2009_REVIEW_HAVE_A_NICE_LIFE_George_Square_2_August_13_20090813

https://www.broadwayworld.com/article/Edinburgh_Fringe_2009_REVIEW_THE_GREAT_BRITISH_SOAP_OPERA_George_Square_2_August_12_20090812

https://www.broadwayworld.com/article/Edinburgh_Festival_2009_REVIEW_OVER_THE_THRESHOLD_George_Square_2_August_13_20090813

https://www.broadwayworld.com/article/Edinburgh_Festival_2009_REVIEW_CHAT_A_NEW_BRITISH_MUSICAL_George_Square_2_August_11_20090811

https://www.broadwayworld.com/article/Edinburgh_Festical_2009_REVIEW_FALSETTOLAND_George_Square_2_August_11_20090811

THEATRE 2020: CURTAINS**** LET'S HEAR IT FOR THE GIRLS***** WICKED***** KEITH RAMSAY TAKING NOTES WITH EDWARD SECKERSON***** KAYLEIGH MCKNIGHT CONCERT***** RAGS***** ON MCQUILLAN'S HILL** DEAR EVAN HANSEN***** THE JURY***

re: Back from a (fantastic!) week at the Fringe

Posted: 8/18/09 at 6:31am

Of those I only saw Have A Nice Life and absolutely loved it - I enjoyed your review too, and it's a shame it didn't have a bigger profile. Went twice, brought my friends the second time and they all loved it. Such a fantastic cast and production.

Saw Porn: The Musical too, or 20 minutes of it anyway before we walked out. Horrendous.

Also preferred the production of RENT: School Edition to the regular one.

re: Back from a (fantastic!) week at the Fringe

Posted: 8/19/09 at 11:31am

Glad you loved Have A Nice Life. It really was quite special. And all the cast were really lovely too - had a great chat with them after the second time I saw the show.

I almost went to see Porn but was not able to fit it in - seems like I had a lucky escape LOL.

My reviews of Wolfboy and Six Ways are now up:

https://www.broadwayworld.com/article/EDINBURGH_FESTIVAL_2009_REVIEW_WOLFBOY_George_Square_4_August_15_20090819

https://www.broadwayworld.com/article/EDINBURGH_FESTIVAL_2009_REVIEW_SIX_WAYS_George_Square_2_August_12_20090819

re: Back from a (fantastic!) week at the Fringe

Posted: 8/19/09 at 2:09pm

I just got back from an exhausting but highly enjoyable four days in Edinburgh and 18 shows! Musical theatre featured heavily but I also got to see some musical performances, comedy, chat - a bit of everything really, except stand-up comedy.

Bob, I agree with your views on 'The Great British Soap Opera' and 'Falsettoland' but I thought 'Chat' seemed more like a work in progress by comparison.

The stand-out highlight for me was 'Morecambe'. Bob Golding, as Eric Morecambe (and many others beside) was outstanding. I laughed and I cried - the perfect show.

Other notable shows were 'Tap and Chat With Lionel Blair', 'Pythonesque', 'Fascinating Aida' and 'Far From Kansas in Oklahomo!'.

No real turkeys, thankfully, but "Almost Like A Virgin', while featuring a very talented singer in Evelyne Brink, had the most toe-curling, embarrassingly awful script - she should have just stuck to singing.

Already I'm thinking that next year I might have to make a whole week or even ten days of it - there is always so much to see (and after three consecutive nights of getting to bed after four a.m. a longer stay with a few early nights might be a good idea).

re: Back from a (fantastic!) week at the Fringe

Posted: 8/19/09 at 2:24pm

I just remembered that Jack Ryder (EastEnders' Jamie Mitchell, husband of Corrie's Kim) was at Sunday's performance of 'The Great British Soap Opera'. He didn't exactly seem to be enjoying himself much, he only laughed at the cruder references!

re: Back from a (fantastic!) week at the Fringe

Posted: 8/19/09 at 6:42pm

Hotjohn - seems like you had a fantastic time too - with albeit a more varied selection of shows than me. There is, as you say, such a wonderfully eclectic mix of theatre on view during the Fringe - but I always find it hard to stray from my first love of musicals! The only non-musical production I saw was Gregory Burke's play Gagarin Way at the Stand Up Comedy Club - a quite stunning staging of a very powerful, incredibly funny, pretty disturbing and brilliant play.

re: Back from a (fantastic!) week at the Fringe

Posted: 8/20/09 at 4:50pm

I know what you mean, it would be very easy to see nothing but musicals for the whole week -a bit like eating a bread sandwich though.

As a huge fan of Morecambe and Wise (I saw them on stage in 1972) the play 'Morecambe' brought back so many wonderful memories and was obviously written by someone who loved them as much as me. In fact, my first time on stage was a special performance of 'The Morecambe and Wise Show' that a friend and I put on for the school summer party in 1971 - I was Eric. We wrote some original material, reproduced some sketches from the telly, had some friends appear as musical guests and even got one friend to drag up as Janet Webb, the large lady who would steal the show at the end.

I wrote to Eric and Ernie at the BBC to tell them about it and they very sweetly wrote back enclosing a photo signed "To Eric and Ernie, Yours Sincerely, Eric and Ernie".

re: Back from a (fantastic!) week at the Fringe

Posted: 8/20/09 at 7:48pm

I liked Porn - it has been nominated for Best Musical in the MTM awards so somebody apart from me liked it. Also getting good reviews.

re: Back from a (fantastic!) week at the Fringe

Posted: 8/21/09 at 3:02am

I read a one-star review as well.

It shouldn't even be called a musical - it has no respect for the genre and is simply a series of dire Viz-style jokes assembled with no skill or imagination whatsoever.

Good for them if they get awards and nominations. There's no accounting for taste.

#10

re: Back from a (fantastic!) week at the Fringe

Posted: 8/23/09 at 10:34pm

Perhaps you should allow for the fact that taste differs. Just because you did not like it means someone who did has bad taste. I would never presume to be so arrogant as to suggest that you have bad taste because you didn't like it.
Also if you left after 20 minutes you can't really comment meaningfully.

#11

re: Back from a (fantastic!) week at the Fringe

Posted: 8/25/09 at 4:51am

Calm down mate - the phrase I used is defined as follows:

Proverb: there's no accounting for taste
- When it comes to subjective matters of taste, people have wildly different opinions
- Disagreements about matters of taste can't be objectively resolved

...which is exactly what you said anyway.

Updated On: 8/25/09 at 04:51 AM

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