Of all this year’s Sauna Theatre propositions at Summerhall, Bubble Schmeisis (Remixed) perhaps feels the most like theatre. There is good reason for that. Nick Cassenbaum’s one-man show was already a sell-out Fringe and international success long before anybody decided to put the audience into swimsuits and turn up the heat.
Ten years on, it has found what feels like its natural home.
This is not simply an old stage show squeezed into a sauna. It feels like a genuine evolution of the piece, with Nick now performing the story inside the very environment he has spent years describing.
And the experience begins before we even get there. Live klezmer music, created for the show by Daniel Gouly and Josh Middleton, accompanies us as we wait to enter and continues inside, becoming an essential part of the communal atmosphere. We are not simply queuing for a play. We are gradually being ushered into Nick’s world.
That world is the Jewish schvitz, not simply somewhere to sweat, but a place of ritual, storytelling, male friendship and community. Nick takes us through journeys to Israel, Jewish summer camps, Tottenham Hotspur, family, identity and ultimately his first schmeiss in a London sauna.
What emerges is a search for belonging. Sitting together in the heat, stripped of clothes and many of the usual social barriers, Nick discovers a feeling of Jewish community perhaps more immediate than he had found elsewhere.
It is also extremely funny. Even the proper pronunciation of beigel becomes material, with hilarious results.
What fascinates me most is what has happened to the theatrical form itself. There is no conventional stage now. Nick is right there amongst us, sweating with us, telling his stories while the musicians play live around this extraordinary little community temporarily created inside a wooden box.
For some, this may not constitute a relaxing sauna. If you want to close your eyes, contemplate existence and listen peacefully to water hissing on hot stones, look elsewhere.
This is communal rather than contemplative, and all the better for it. A successful stage show has not merely been revived, it has finally stepped inside the world it was always talking about.
For authentic storytelling, live music, laughter and a rather wonderful sense of community, there is really only one thing left to do.
Get your kit off.
Playing until August 31st 2026, https://www.edfringe.com/tickets/whats-on/2026BUBBLET
Reviewer: Greg Holstead
Reviewed: 12th August 2026
North West End UK / Theatre Muse UK Rating:
Running time – 1hr 30mins