Last year Recent Cutbacks gave me one of my picks of the Fringe. Fly, You Fools! was gloriously inventive, while Hold On To Your Butts proved equally adept at turning a much loved blockbuster into breathless, brilliantly silly theatre.
So, I arrived at KEVIN!!!!! expecting another hit.
Instead, they have given me Christmas in August.
This Home Alone parody may be described as something wildly different from the company’s other Fringe offerings, but there is an irony here. KEVIN!!!!! was originally developed around ten years ago and, having seen what Recent Cutbacks have subsequently become, this feels less like progression and more like a retro step too far.
The approach is predominantly puppet led, with handmade miniature sets, live cameras, performers racing up and down the Pleasance steps and a barrage of increasingly bitty interactions. There is a lot of running around. There is a lot of shouting. For me, it simply becomes messy.
The blue screen work is another matter. Here you suddenly glimpse the ingenuity I remember from this company, as live performance and deliberately homemade movie making collide beautifully.
There is also some genuinely lovely singing. Nick Abeel, Brendan Dalton, Rosa Palmeri and Natalie Rich harmonise beautifully at times, aided by Richard Sears’s a cappella arrangements. Oh, holy night! OHF!
But they’re singing Christmas music.
In August.
Home Alone is inseparable from Christmas, and Edinburgh during the Fringe is about as far removed from Christmas theatre as I want to be. The seasonal music simply jars.
There is another difficulty. The company’s humour depends upon reproducing remarkably specific moments from the source material. Jurassic Park and The Lord of the Rings seem able to sustain that treatment through sheer cultural familiarity. Home Alone is undoubtedly famous, but remembering every detail of a 1990 film is another matter. Some of the more forensic references simply don’t land.
Michael Guest’s puppetry and the miniature work demonstrate considerable craft, and Kristin McCarthy Parker’s production certainly isn’t short of energy. But it never feels as edgy or theatrically exciting as the Recent Cutbacks I encountered last year.
The good news is that the company already has two hits at the Fringe this year. If you haven’t seen Fly, You Fools! (Till 31st) or Hold On To Your Butts (3 shows only), I have absolutely no difficulty recommending them.
But KEVIN!!!!!?
Let’s put a question mark after that one.
Playing until August 31st 2026, https://www.edfringe.com/tickets/whats-on/2026KEVIN
Reviewer: Greg Holstead
Reviewed: 8th August 2026
North West End UK / Theatre Muse UK Rating:
Running time – 1hr