Edinburgh
Edinburgh Fringe 2023 reviews: The Grand Old Opera House Hotel / YOU ARE GOING TO DIETuesday, 15 August 2023The Grand Old Opera House Hotel, Traverse Theatre ★★★The Traverse Theatre’s biggest, most lavish production for the 2023 festival is bold, colourful and joyful. It’s also, however, a somewhat patchy creation. Aaron (a gangly, gormless Ali... Read more... |
Edinburgh Fringe 2023 reviews: Adults / BaconMonday, 14 August 2023Adults, Traverse Theatre ★★★Outside the festival madness of August, Edinburgh is a bit of a village. So it’s no surprise if you keep bumping into people you know. For entrepreneurial Zara, however, it nonetheless comes as a shock that the... Read more... |
Edinburgh Fringe 2023 reviews: Casting the Runes / The Return / WoodhillSaturday, 12 August 2023Casting the Runes, Pleasance Courtyard ★★★★ A viciously critical review gets its unfortunate writer driven mad and sent to an untimely death in this adaptation of a macabre MR James chiller. In that case, I’d better be careful what I say... Read more... |
Trojan Women / Thrown, Edinburgh International Festival 2023 reviews - passionate all-women productionsFriday, 11 August 2023Trojan Women, Festival Theatre ★★★★★You can feel the white-hot intensity radiating from the stage virtually from start to finish of this remarkable, hypnotic production from the National Changgeuk Company of Korea and Singaporean director... Read more... |
Ilker Arcayürek, Malcolm Martineau, Edinburgh International Festival 2023 review - vocal tension saved by poetic pianismThursday, 10 August 2023It’s an everyday story of festival folk. The festival’s Queen’s Hall concert on Wednesday morning was meant to be a song recital from Günther Groissböck, but he cancelled at (I’m told very) short notice due to illness and the festival team had to... Read more... |
Edinburgh International Festival 2023 reviews: FOOD / DuskThursday, 10 August 2023FOOD, The Studio ★★★There’s no denying it: Los Angeles-born Geoff Sobelle is a theatrical magician (quite literally – it’s how he began his career). Through a string of visually spectacular shows on the Fringe and more recently at the... Read more... |
Edinburgh Fringe 2023 reviews: Heaven / Lie Low / After the ActWednesday, 09 August 2023Heaven, Traverse Theatre ★★★★★It’s a rare show that combines form and content to quite such devastatingly potent effect. The storyline of two-hander Heaven from Dublin-based Fishamble theatre company might seem simple: a middle-aged couple... Read more... |
Edinburgh Fringe 2023 reviews: Stuntman / Beautiful Evil Things / What You See When Your Eyes Are Closed...Tuesday, 08 August 2023Stuntman, Summerhall ★★★★★Masculinity and violence are hot subjects for theatrical examination – and dance theatre two-hander Stuntman from Scottish company Superfan is far from the only Fringe show that investigates them this year. What... Read more... |
Stefan Jackiw and Friends, Edinburgh International Festival 2023 review - focused playing, with restraint thrown to the windsMonday, 07 August 2023And we’re off! This concert marked the beginning not just of the 2023 Edinburgh International Festival but, perhaps more importantly, of Nicola Benedetti’s tenure in charge as the EIF’s Director. She came onstage for a chat before a note of music... Read more... |
Edinburgh Fringe 2023 reviews: Ed Byrne / Fiona Allen / Kieran HodgsonMonday, 07 August 2023Ed Byrne Assembly Rooms ★★★★★ Ed Byrne has frequently referenced his loved ones in previous shows but this new hour is one he would never wanted to have written, as it was prompted by the death of his younger brother, Paul, last year. Its title,... Read more... |
Edinburgh Fringe 2023 reviews: The Death and Life of All of Us / Anything That We Wanted To Be / ChickenSaturday, 05 August 2023The Death and Life of All of Us, Summerhall ★★★★Victor Esses was 16 when he first discovered his grandmother had a sister – someone the family had never discussed. It was just a year after his own first illicit visit to a gay sauna.Esses’s... Read more... |
Album: Dot Allison - ConsciousologyThursday, 27 July 2023This album promises to be an expansion of the sound and ideas of its 2021 predecessor Heart Shaped Scars, and boy does it deliver. HSS was the Scottish singer-songwriter Dot Allison’s first album in some nine years, and only her... Read more... |