REVIEWS Archives - Page 172 of 545

6Aug

By Greg HolsteadNo Comments

Scotland

St. Matthew’s Passion – Usher Hall

The second Passion of the 2024 Edinburgh International Festival, following on immediately from the opening night Concert, Osvaldo Gilijov’s extraordinaryLa Pasio Segun San Marcos,a reinterpretation of Bach’s St. Matthew’s Passion from 2000. However, tonight too is a reworking of Bach’s original masterpiece. The young Felix Mendelssohn transformed Johann Sebastian Bach’s majestic St Matthew Passion for modern orchestra. We hear his (rarely performed) groundbreaking arrangement from Leipzig 1841. Arguably this changed the course of music history, and without it the great Bach revival of the 19th Century might never have happened. There would surely have been an argument to host a third Passion, the original, using baroque instruments, which would sound very different again. A...

Wyld Woman: The Legend of Shy Girl – Assembly Rooms

6Aug

By Tom ScottNo Comments

Scotland

Wyld Woman: The Legend of Shy Girl – Assembly Rooms

A twenty something New Yorker is painfully shy. On first seeing us, she struggles to get a word out. She holds a set of crib cards to help her through what is clearly an ordeal. The shyness affects her physicality, too. Although she’s standing, she curls up as if she’s trying to make herself as small and insignificant as possible, hoping that no-one will notice her. Gradually shy girl relaxes. She welcomes us to her apartment and calls us ‘Legends’. She aspires to be one, too. Legends are people who are not shy, thus cool. Shy girl doesn’t have any real friends, but lots of imaginary ones. It turns out that we in the audience are her imaginary friends, too. And she’s using us to rehearse for the arrival of some real Legends who she’s invited to dinner. This is a hugely enterta...

Finding Splashman: Aunty Ginger – Assembly George Square Studios

6Aug

By Ben PearsonNo Comments

Scotland

Finding Splashman: Aunty Ginger – Assembly George Square Studios

At last year’s Edinburgh Fringe, I was lucky enough to review Aunty Ginger’s highly entertaining show I Consent. So, I was excited, if a tad nervous (what if it didn’t live up to last time?) to go and see Finding Splashman. I’m thrilled to say that I was not disappointed. Aunty Ginger is as engaging, sassy and stupendously fun as ever. This time round, she’s hired a director, and it shows. Mikey Smith brings an element of fluidity to the performance that was slightly absent last time. Now her hilarious gags and segments, including ‘Aunty Ginger’s Problem Area’, in which she solves all kinds of explicit sexual problems, flow seamlessly from one another. It no longer feels like she’s jumping from sketch to sketch, but rather a complete performance. Another welcome addition was the int...

I’d Like A Job Please – Paradise at the Vault

6Aug

By Susan CohenNo Comments

Scotland

I’d Like A Job Please – Paradise at the Vault

This show follows Sarah Snelson, a recent graduate looking for her first ‘real’ job. Rejected at interview for the position of barista (‘it’s coffee, how hard can it be?’), she teeters on the edge of being drawn into a scam - a wellness cult - by an immediate offer of a ‘job’ (‘you only make money if you sell’ … ‘just read from the script’ … ‘absolutely, it’s all backed by science’ …). She's bombarded with misinformation and prejudice from what sometimes seems like every angle, including a misogynistic get-rich-quick podcast. From the off, it becomes obvious that this is no ordinary comedy sketch show for although it definitely delivers the laughs, it’s also cleverly woven into a coherent, often surprising and thought provoking narrative. Accompanied by live key...

6Aug

By Oliver GigginsNo Comments

Scotland

Ghost Light – the Space @ Niddrie St

In 1865's London, aspiring author Henry Webster befriends Edward Price at the local Ghost Club. The latter tells Henry about a real haunting at a nearby lodging-house, where the ghosts of two young children apparently wander the house in search of light... The two men decide to investigate. Orange Works' Ghost Light is a classic ghost story, being set in Victorian England, including candlelight wanderings, ghostly children's chants and vengeful spirits. It even name-checks the most famous ghost-story writer of the era, Charles Dickens (well, at least for A Christmas Carol and The Signalman). This gives the production a somewhat predictable quality, though not entirety in a negative way: these tropes are classics for a reason, and the cast are good-storytellers, their voices being vi...

Michael Brunstrom: Copernicus Now – Hoots @ Potterow, Big Yurt

6Aug

By Caroline WorswickNo Comments

Scotland

Michael Brunstrom: Copernicus Now – Hoots @ Potterow, Big Yurt

Recommended to me by a friend, I tootled along to the Big Yurt to see how you can possibly make a comedy show out of a Renaissance polymath called Nicolaus Copernicus and his work. Well, if your name if Michael Brunstrom you can! Drawing his material from the mathematician/astronomer that was under his microscope, his show is both clever and ridiculous. We are briefed about his process, which lures the audience in his balmy scheme, but he is so endearing, that you want to come along for the journey. His material is refreshing, no mother-in-law jokes here, but the fact that he chooses to use such a high-brow intellectual as the subject of his humour, makes this show so interesting. Brunstrom has a natural delivery, a self-deprecating humour which you cannot help ...

Athens Of The North – Edinburgh Hibernian Supporters Club

6Aug

By Roger JacobsNo Comments

Scotland

Athens Of The North – Edinburgh Hibernian Supporters Club

Riveting from the first sentence to the last, the words ‘drop’, pin’ and ‘hear’ came straight to mind. Mark Hannah’s representation of delivery driver Alan, London meteorology (and holiday romance victim) student Liam and ageing Embra senior Maureen faultless in every respect. A trip to the Hibs Supporters Club (venue 449) on Sunnyside is off the beaten track for Fringe-goers but the daunder will be well worth it, if only so you can say ‘I saw Mark Hannah before he was…’ He plays all three characters intersecting at different points on the same day and it’s Alan’s story that sets the scene, adrift from his partner and desperate to see his daughter Erin perform at St Giles Cathedral. He’s had a rough morning having to deliver a mattress to an address near Peffermill he has his own re...

The Phantom of the Opera – The Edinburgh Academy Magnusson Theatre

6Aug

By Torya HughesNo Comments

Scotland

The Phantom of the Opera – The Edinburgh Academy Magnusson Theatre

With a challenging operatic score, some of the most memorable tunes in musical theatre, and a huge reputation to live up to, “The Phantom of the Opera” is a bold choice for Captivate Theatre. However, they are more than capable of doing it justice, with a talented cast and near faultless vocal performances. The musical needs little introduction, but tells the story of Christine, a chorus girl in the opera who is thrust into the leading role after a strange incident causes the prima donna Carlotta to storm out. Christine has been tutored by the Phantom, her “angel of music”, a shadowy figure who lives in the sewers of the opera house. New owners take over the company, including a rich patron named Raoul, who is Christine’s childhood friend. They rekindle a friendship which turns into lov...

I Am Yours Sincerely – The Space Triplex

6Aug

By Susan CohenNo Comments

Scotland

I Am Yours Sincerely – The Space Triplex

It’s quite something when you’re lucky enough to come across that kind of theatrical magic which happens only once in a while – that thing where the audience gets lost in the performance and the story just starts to sing. And what a story! Ed Saunders-Lee is the writer and performer of the life story of his step-grandfather, First Lieutenant John Cox, a member of the Special Operations Executive who was parachuted behind enemy lines in France and Burma during WWII. In this single hander, Saunders-Lee manages to convey a sense of the passage of time and with it, a battled hardened growth of experience – from naïve young student to war hero who witnesses the horrors of war, with all its complexities. The performance takes place in an intimate space in the round, wi...

5Aug

By Caroline WorswickNo Comments

Scotland

After Troy – the Space @ Surgeon’s Hall

Following the battle of Troy, what was left for the survivors? Homeless and suffering the loss of loved ones, the women of Troy grieved on the past, and faced uncertainty about their future. Based upon the tragedy ‘Trojan Women’ written by Euripides which was first performed in Athens in 415 BC, this exploration into the aftermath of the defeat of the Trojans following ten years of war, tells the tale of the women who were left behind to pick up the pieces. Presented by Badminton School, the story is weaved with actual threads, each character has her own thread, and when they share their experiences, they weave another part of life’s tapestry. Andromache is grieving over the loss of her husband; the Trojan prince Hector, she must now face the loss of her chil...