Greg Holstead, Author at North West End UK

The Ghost of White Hart Lane – Underbelly Bristo Sq

22Aug

By Greg HolsteadNo Comments

Scotland

The Ghost of White Hart Lane – Underbelly Bristo Sq

There was an odd triptych of personal coincidences waiting for me in The Ghost of White Hart Lane. I live in Musselburgh, where John White grew up, I previously lived in Falkirk, where he played before heading south, and I have a daughter called Elsie, also the name given by White's son Rob to one of his two daughters. If ever a story ought to have drawn me in, this was probably it. Written and directed by Martin Murphy, from Rob White and Julie Welch's book, the production is performed by Cal Newman, who negotiates an extraordinary collection of characters as we move between John's remarkable footballing career and Rob's attempts to discover the father he never knew. The Musselburgh material particularly interested me. White played locally before joining Bonnyrigg Rose, while w...

Mysteries of the Picts – Sauna Theatre Summerhall

22Aug

By Greg HolsteadNo Comments

Scotland

Mysteries of the Picts – Sauna Theatre Summerhall

There is something wonderfully Fringe about sitting in a sauna with 47 other souls while being invited to contemplate whether the Picts were partial to a good steam. Mysteries of the Picts explores not only Pictish culture but the much longer history of sauna itself, looking at archaeological evidence for sweathouses and communal bathing stretching back thousands of years. When it comes specifically to the Picts, things become rather more speculative. There is no firm archaeological evidence that they used saunas, although the production reasonably suggests that sacred gathering places may subsequently have disappeared beneath churches, civic buildings and other later development. It is interesting, although the history and archaeology remain somewhat vague. Where the produc...

22Aug

By Greg HolsteadNo Comments

Scotland

Haribo Kimchi – Studio Theatre

Jaha Koo's gentle, curious piece didn't particularly move or affect me while I was watching it. Yet the following morning I found myself still thinking about its snail, singing gummy bear and extraordinary electronic eel. Perhaps this is a show whose flavours develop over time. The Studio is a comfortable, well-raked room with a generous stage. Upon it sits an almost pagoda-like structure, its sloping translucent surfaces becoming screens onto which images of a Korean metropolis are projected. Percussive music accompanies them and a brightly illuminated orange crown completes a rather striking opening image. Koo arrives and quite literally peels this theatrical exterior away. Underneath is something altogether more prosaic: the stainless-steel counter of a Korean street-food stall (p...

22Aug

By Greg HolsteadNo Comments

Scotland

Scaramouche Jones – Assembly Bijou

Where on earth is everybody? Justin Butcher is giving what is arguably the finest one-man performance I have seen at this year's Edinburgh Fringe. Scaramouche Jones is theatre-making and storytelling of the absolute highest quality. And the Bijou tent is barely a quarter full. What is going on? Butcher's Scaramouche Jones has been travelling the world for 25 years. Pete Postlethwaite originated the role, directed by Rupert Goold, and the play itself has subsequently travelled internationally. Maybe nobody wants to see a 25-year-old play, or perhaps it is just not to the ‘modern’ palate. Whatever the reason, what a joy it was to discover. On Millennium Eve, 1999, Scaramouche stands on the brink of his hundredth birthday and takes us back through an extr...

21Aug

By Greg HolsteadNo Comments

Scotland

Come From Away – Assembly Ballroom

There are some shows you admire and others that catch you rather more unexpectedly. Captivate Theatre's Come From Away did both. I saw it with my daughter, and remarkably it was the first time either of us had encountered the musical. Sharing that first experience became one of my highlights of this year's Fringe. Irene Sankoff and David Hein's musical takes us to Gander, Newfoundland, where 38 aircraft carrying almost 7,000 passengers were diverted following the attacks of 11 September 2001. It hardly sounds like the starting point for an uplifting musical, yet the extraordinary generosity of the local community provides exactly that. Getting the balance right is crucial. There must be laughter amongst the darkness and Captivate finds it beautifully. A moose appearing ...

The Man Who Thought He Knew Too Much – Pleasance Courtyard

21Aug

By Greg HolsteadNo Comments

Scotland

The Man Who Thought He Knew Too Much – Pleasance Courtyard

Voloz Collective have two propositions at this year's Fringe and having already seen their newer REDACTED: The Cover-Up of a Cover-Up of a Cover-Up, I found myself watching The Man Who Thought He Knew Too Much rather unusually, seeing the company's evolution backwards. Set in 1963, it follows Roger Clement, played by Paul Lofferon, a French advertising executive in New York who’s meticulously ordered existence is disrupted when being late for work saves him from an explosion. What follows is an increasingly improbable international chase, delivered through Voloz's trademark combination of physical theatre, object work, comedy and live music. Lofferon is joined by Voloz co-artistic directors Olivia Zerphy, Emily Wheatman and Sam Rayner, all four having trained at L'...

Linus Karp Was Hit With an Umbrella – Underbelly Bristo Sq

21Aug

By Greg HolsteadNo Comments

Scotland

Linus Karp Was Hit With an Umbrella – Underbelly Bristo Sq

Linus Karp has put his own name very prominently on the poster this time. After Diana: The Untold and Untrue Story and Gwyneth Goes Skiing, perhaps this is someone increasingly comfortable with the limelight. More importantly, however, this is his own story. Shortly before the 2024 Fringe, Karp was walking through Soho with his partner Joseph Martin when he was subjected to a homophobic attack and struck across the head with an umbrella. Karp specifically points out that the couple weren't holding hands, kissing or even touching at the time. From that distinctly unfunny starting point, he has somehow constructed a surprisingly funny, thoughtful piece of theatre. This is recognisably an Awkward Prods show. Two monitors flank the stage, providing locations, news reports,...

21Aug

By Greg HolsteadNo Comments

Scotland

Bebe Cave: Swoon – Pleasance Dome

You have to marvel at the sheer industry of Bebe Cave. Swoon is not simply an hour of character comedy. Cave appears to have swallowed a substantial chunk of Victorian art history, constructed a beautifully gilded Pre-Raphaelite world of curtains, frames and tableaux, assembled an armoury of hats and costumes, and then decided to perform all of the people inhabiting it herself. The result is extremely funny and occasionally almost impossible to keep up with. Cave's starting point is John Everett Millais's Ophelia and Elizabeth Siddal, the woman who modelled for one of the most recognisable paintings in British art. From there, through the fictional Bertrude Siddal, she charges headlong into Rossetti, Millais, Holman Hunt, Victorian womanhood, beauty, madness, mu...

21Aug

By Greg HolsteadNo Comments

Scotland

Tell Me – Summerhall Dissection Room

The Dissection Room at Summerhall is a fascinating space, double height and voluminous, and Tell Me certainly knows how to celebrate that verticality. At its centre stands a giant open metal cube. Inside that sits another, and another, a Russian doll of skeletal geometry which performers Sadiq Ali, Phoebe Knight and Jonah Russell climb through, hang from, rotate and send tumbling across its different surfaces. There is something of the rolling of dice about it too. During the AIDS crisis, whether you received that positive diagnosis could seem like the biggest roll of the dice imaginable. Tell Me moves between that crisis and our contemporary understanding of HIV. The dramaturgy is often beautifully handled. Radio announcements report the emergence of this frigh...

21Aug

By Greg HolsteadNo Comments

Scotland

Penelope – Underbelly Belly Button

Grace McLean's hands deserve a review of their own. In Penelope, they become almost another piece of stage machinery. A picture on a bedside table is conjured between her fingers, suddenly forming something resembling a tiny Grecian image. Later, as Penelope describes working at her loom, McLean's hands weave invisible landscapes, seascapes and portraits in the air before methodically undoing them again. It is mesmerising physical storytelling. Penelope has promised that she will marry one of her suitors when her weaving is finished. Her solution is beautifully simple: create by day, unpick by night, and keep waiting for Odysseus. And she has been waiting a very long time. There is initially something almost Liza Minnelli-like about McLean's performance, ...