Saturday, August 9, 2025
A lively, wriggly tube creature, mesmerising birds for babies and a joyful take on Joyce’s Ulysses will delight young audiences at this year’s festival
Assembly Rooms, 10.10am, until 24 …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 09:32AMTraverse, EdinburghSibling envy, a stumbling acting career and addiction are covered in an indistinctive show by the sister of Carl
There are many urgent topics demanding our attention on th…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:03AMScottish Storytelling Centre, Edinburgh Alan Bissett embodies both the expansive Big Yin and the detached author of Lanark in a thoughtful, entertaining search for their conn…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 12:54AMFriday, August 8, 2025
Traverse, EdinburghIn Dan Colley’s evocative play, a retired actor with dementia loops through scenes from the classic tragedy
A play remains a classic for as long as it continues to yield…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 05:18PMSummerhall, EdinburghIn a poetic performance, former teenage grunge obsessive Emma Frankland takes heart from a fantasy about the Nirvana musician
There is a fashionable theory among pop rev…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 04:12AMThursday, August 7, 2025
Summerhall, Edinburgh Polish company’s musical take on Shakespeare’s death-fixated drama is full of feeling, but its story never really sings
It begins with lines from Under the Earth I …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:24PMAssembly George Square Studios, EdinburghNina Khyzhna performs a collage of poetic dance-theatre that embodies the everyday trauma of life in Kharkiv
In Pokémon lore, the distortion world i…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 05:32AMWednesday, August 6, 2025
A tech twist on Hamlet, a glimpse into a catastrophic future and a uniquely personalised tale of societal breakdown immerse fringe audiences in the haunting uncertainty of artificial intelli…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 11:48AMTuesday, August 5, 2025
Pleasance at EICC, EdinburghIn Michel Marc Bouchard’s play, a young man travels to his boyfriend’s rural funeral and finds his family are unaware of their relationship
Socially, you know…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 05:18PMTraverse theatre, EdinburghHumanity and understanding permeate Gabriel Jason Dean’s play inspired by a real-life relationship but awkward questions remain unasked
Families fell out over Br…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 05:18PMTraverse theatre, EdinburghPanto dame Dorothy Blawna-Gale is sharp-tongued and lovable but the hilarity is underpinned by creator Johnny McKnight’s personal story
She stands before us in a…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 04:02AMSummerhall, EdinburghIn Bed With My Brother’s story of cult band the Shaggs is a furious and funny rallying cry against patriarchy and perfection
If fringe favourites Sh!t Theatre had a mi…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:54AMMonday, August 4, 2025
Gilded Balloon, EdinburghMaking her fringe debut, the EastEnders star plays a tribute act to the Hollywood legend in this dreary drama
Rarely has the cult of celebrity alighted on someone wi…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 10:32AMPleasance Courtyard, EdinburghThis tremendous solo show by Jade Franks uses deep rage and deadpan wit to skewer the ruling class
She has glittery nail extensions and her hair scraped back. O…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 05:03AMSunday, August 3, 2025
Summerhall, EdinburghEmma Howlett’s play spins several stories – including those of astronomer Vera Rubin and a PhD student – with a light touch
There are known knowns, there are known…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 11:36AMSaturday, August 2, 2025
Pleasance Courtyard, EdinburghIn a confident verbatim show, Priyanka Shetty snaps from voice to voice to create a rich vision of the social fabric torn by the 2017 Unite the Right rally atta…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 11:32AMUnderbelly Bristo Square, EdinburghAlex Hill’s boisterous one-man show teases a trade-off between the belonging and camaraderie of football fandom and personal stability
Football is coming…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 09:24AMFriday, August 1, 2025
Pleasance Courtyard, Edinburgh Niall Moorjani plays a storyteller facing public execution for joining an uprising against India’s colonial rulers
When it comes to…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:06AMPleasance Courtyard, EdinburghHalf lecture, half nightmare, this high-precision performance blurs the line between medic and patient in a Victorian asylum for mentally ill women
In 19th-cent…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:03AMThursday, July 31, 2025
Pleasance Courtyard, EdinburghAaron Pang’s sweet yet sharp one-man show about the mismatch between his erotic desire and physical capability needles the audience’s need for comfortable r…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:06AMMonday, July 28, 2025
Williamson Park, LancasterColourful adaptation with pretty original songs makes the most of a family promenade in the park, as Hope Yolanda’s energetic hero searches for Toto
Who needs E…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 08:02AMSunday, July 27, 2025
Royal Court, LiverpoolMotherland writer Helen Serafinowicz transforms a dubious account about the footballer and his then girlfriend into a storybook tale of broad-stroke comedy
Sometimes fa…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 10:54AMGrosvenor Park, ChesterThe debonair detective heads north for this breezily daft mystery featuring a missing masterpiece, vicious nuns and a full-bodied rendition of I Will Survive
We think …
SOURCE: The Guardian at 07:36AMMonday, July 14, 2025
As Brendan Gleeson prepares for his role in a revival of the 1997 hit, the stars of earlier productions toast its deceptively moving and profound barfly banter
Appearances are deceptive. On…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 11:18AMFriday, June 27, 2025
Tron theatre, GlasgowDouglas Maxwell’s monologue about a dog walker moves from lighthearted to maudlin as it evokes a world in limbo
A few blocks down the road on Argyle Street, a stall is…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 01:06PMFriday, June 20, 2025
Peter Pan has a pop fantasy, Faustus is in Africa, Brian Cox leads a banking satire and Billy Connolly meets the late Alasdair Gray. Elsewhere, the joy of pickling, a landmark jazz album and…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 05:06AMFriday, June 6, 2025
Pitlochry Festival theatreRichard Baron and Ellie Zeegen’s play follows the writer from wide-eyed child discovering nature in rural Scotland to feisty care-home resident
The title comes f…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:02PMWednesday, June 4, 2025
New Vic, Newcastle-under-LymeIsabella Rossi, making her debut, gives Arthur Berry’s drama of working-class life a burst of colour and energy
The first word ever spoken on the New Vic stage…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 05:24PMTuesday, May 27, 2025
Various venues, Edinburgh Delightful shows for youngsters include surreally inventive shadowplay and backstage chaos, while Greg Sinclair brings tricky phrases to life using a cake and someo…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 12:18PMSunday, May 18, 2025
Horden Methodist Church, County DurhamEnsemble ’84 generate an exhilarating racket in this gutsy rendition of Brecht’s play about the thirty years’ war
The noise is constant. It is i…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 03:42PMFriday, May 16, 2025
Royal Lyceum, Edinburgh Martin Green’s play, set in a village still traumatised by the miners’ strike, follows a young musician under pressure from all sides
Towards the end of Martin Gr…
SOURCE: The Guardian at 06:18AM 
