Scotland

Tricky Ricky, Jingles All The Way – Edinburgh International Magic Festival

There’s a particular challenge to the Christmas morning family show: you’re dealing with excitable children, coffee-deprived adults, and a room that’s already humming before you’ve said a word. Jingles All The Way, Tricky Ricky’s festive offering at the Scottish Storytelling Centre as part of the Edinburgh Magic Festival, meets that challenge with confidence, warmth, and a good understanding of its audience.

Ricky pitches his comedy in broadly Shrek-style territory, knowingly silly, fast-moving, and deliberately aimed across the child–adult divide. For the most part, it works. The jokes come thick and fast, the tone is inclusive rather than condescending, and there’s a sense that he’s genuinely comfortable working a mixed-age crowd. That ease is hardly surprising: Ricky has spent many years performing for children at Edinburgh’s Sick Kids Hospital, and it shows in his relaxed authority and instinctive sense of when to push the energy and when to rein it back.

The standout section of the show is unquestionably Jingles the Reindeer, the second of Ricky’s ventriloquism segments. The reindeer character is sharply drawn, genuinely funny, and armed with a set of strong catchphrases that children seize on immediately. There’s a passing visual resemblance to Donkey from Shrek, and it’s a useful point of reference: quick-witted, slightly unhinged, and very comfortable skewering its human counterpart. The ventriloquism itself is assured, but it’s the character work that really lands, making this the clear high point of the show.

Earlier sections lean more heavily into interaction, jokes, and comic business, and while the magic is always present, it’s not initially foregrounded. That makes the final routine, a classic rope-cutting trick involving an audience volunteer repeatedly cutting and restoring a rope, particularly effective. Cleanly performed and well paced, it lands with unexpected force. After the lively, chatty opening, the sudden emphasis on straightforward, well-executed magic briefly stills the room. The audience reaction shifts from laughter to genuine astonishment, a reminder that beneath the festive chaos there’s a solid magician at work.

Jingles All The Way isn’t trying to reinvent the genre, and it doesn’t need to. What it offers instead is a confident, good-natured Christmas show that understands its audience, respects their intelligence (whatever their age), and knows exactly when to lean into character comedy and when to let the magic speak for itself. For families looking for something warm, funny, and properly live on a winter morning, it does exactly what it sets out to do – and does it well!

Reviewer: Greg Holstead

Reviewed: 28th December 2025

North West End UK Rating: