Fringe Reviews 2015!!! (part 1)

Big Shot ****
Attempts on Her Life ***
Half a Sixpence ***
Happy Girl ***
Ada **
Clickbait **
Ursula Invents Old Woman **

Fringe 2013 Reviews

Brand New Ancients *****
The Librarians ****
Barry Brennan’s Bi-monthly Dungeons and Dragons Sessions ****
You're A Good Man Charlie Brown ****
It's Not What You Know... ****
Punchline ***
Salome ***
Metamorphosis ***
Bin Laden: The One Man Show ***
Toi Toi Toi ***
The Autumn of Han ***
Speak No Evil **
Harder Please **
Expiration Date **
Kierkegaard Comedy Show **
The Road to Qatar **

The Critic: Burning Out at Festivals.

Sometimes when you have seen average show after average show it becomes hard to tell if something is really bad, or you are just bored of mediocrity. One begins to merge into the other. In this instance a great show is an oasis in the dessert which brings you back to your senses. See one as soon as possible if you want to savour any hope of remaining objective and judicious. Take recommendations if you have to, read other reliable critics to know what to go to. It is essential to have this nourishment to keep your writing fresh, if not your sanity!

Star Ratings

At best star ratings can be considered a necessary evil.

They not only de-emphasise the content of the review, including any constructive feedback, but they say nothing about how, why or to whom something is good, excellent or poor - not to speak of the grounds upon which something is being judged, nor by which measure stick or what parameters.A four star show on the professional stage is a five star show on the amateur one.

Everything must be judged in its appropriate context, and something may seem more or less pore in comparison to similar works, or the time and place where it is being written or performed. The body of a review leaves some space to give some of this context, but a star rating does nothing of the kind.

There is much difference between a "very good" 3* show and a "not poor" one. Likewise there is a breadth between a truly excellent 4* and one that made it because it is clearly  a leap ahead of most of what the 3* shows have been, thus it is the tone of the piece will dictate what side of the star rating the show in on, not the star rating itself.

I'm a Professional

Why does everyone glorify being professional?

Being professional means you can't turn up with a hangover.
Being professional means you can't turn up late.
Being professional means you can't get drunk!
Being professional means you can't sleep with the actress, or the barmaid.
Being professional means you have to get in at a reasonable time.
Being professional means you have to get Up at a reasonable time!
Being professional means - you have to listen here - this is serious!
Being professional means you have to walk the walk like you talk the talk.
Being professional means you have to act like you know what you're doing, even when you don't! Which is most of the time.
Being professional means you have to act like everyone else knows what they're doing, even when they don't! Which is most of the time.

Maybe, just maybe, if we all just Stop!... this glorification of being professional,
then we can all enjoy... being unprofessional together...

- Hold on - oh, shit, sorry, I have to take this. It's a business call.

14/08/13

Relationship Critic

Once in every critic's Fringe it becomes necessary for them to go out for a drink with the actor of a one man show and his girlfriend to give him extensive feedback on the production, and end up giving the two an impromptu relationship counselling session lasting over an hour when a conflict breaks out. Oh, wait a minute - that's not every critic. That's just me.

How long does it take to become a good critic?

So that's a new record for me. Writing 7 reviews in one sitting.

I reckon it takes writing around 100 reviews before you get the "hang" of it. That is, if you ever truly get the hang of it, which most of us don't think we ever do. At least it's likely to take writing that many before you can be consistently concise, get your point across, say everything that needs to be said, and of course - a most important discipline - to distiguish between what needs to be said and what you just fancy saying (because it's clever, or you noticed, or it's a bugbear, or..., or..., or..., - will the reader care as much as you do?)

Being a critic isn't mostly glamour and fun, what glamour and fun there is comes in exchange for taking care in, and caring about, your writing.

Fringe 2013

Ahhhhh now this feels like the fringe. One hour between shows and being across the road in Pret a Manger having a filer coffee and trying to sneak in some writing so I have less to do when I get home!!! This is the way it was meant to be for us behind the pen, in a constant state of feeling like we're in a rush.

Quinny

So I wrote 4000 words of a novel today and just typed it up at Sam and Fiona's. 

If I was to say it reminded me of any author I'd have to say Nick Hornby (who wrote About A Boy, High Fidelity, Fever Pitch, etc.)

Here's the first draft of the first chapter for those who want to read it, I hope it's amusing but it doesn't get into the action until the second ;) ...

Ch. 1 You can call me Quinny, if you have to.

My name is Claire Quinn. Quinny for short, or if we're intimate, which we're not, and Clarissa exclusively if you're my mum because no one else who knows the name given to me at birth by my drunken father, may he rest in pieces, would dare call me it to my face.

Now where was I? Oh yes, my name is Claire Quinn and I'm going to see my ex-boyfriend for the first time in a year. Almost a year exactly. I know because we broke up on the 15th of May 1996, spoke on the phone twice in June, and then once again at the end of July when he asked if he could borrow my couch between the 1st and 6th of August, which, feeling obliged for the time he let me stay in his house for two weeks when he was on holiday and I was between flats, I allowed him to, and barely spoke a word to him while I did. Looking a little glum he left on the morning of the 6th, thanking me half-heartedly, and never got in touch with me again until recently, save to send a thank-you card.

I know what you're thinking. This Claire, or rather, Quinny, as you've probably got me pegged by now, thinking that we're intimate because I've shared all this with you, we’re not, or just because it's the more memorable of the two names I've mentioned (yes, two,) she's rather particular, is what she is. She's very pedantic. Well, people have said that I'm pedantic, and I don't mind it at all that much at all. I think that precise details make everything sharp, and a lack of clarity simply leaves everything confused, but I digress. I suppose you're thinking, 'She sounds rather obsessed with this chap really, a whole year and she's remembering all these tiny little details,' but in fact I'm not obsessed with him thank you very much, and I only remember all these details because of the particulars of the situation. In fact I'm only cogitating over them and sharing them with you because it's a worthy distraction from what I'm experiencing now, which is a mixture between dread, butterflies, and a healthy dose of acrimony. 

Ah, yes, that's it you see. Now we're into the meat and potatoes you say, this sounds interesting! Dread, butterflies and acrimony, that I can sink my teeth into, you ruddy bunch of sadists. Well I shan't be willing to talk about it, so you can all go hang so far as I care.

Oh all right then. I don't like to talk about my feelings in retrospect, and certainly not in the present tense, but since you've all been kind enough to turn up and hear my story told, you curious lot of voyeurs, I might as well share something worth sharing, mightn't I? Otherwise this whole piece will just descend into a continuous prevarication of the matter at hand, and it would be a shame to waste such an endearing literary style as mine on a mere bagatelle.

It seems a shame to use the term bagatelle in the derogatory sense though, since Beethoven composed many very lovely ones. (I particularly like no. 1 from op. 119.)  I could have said trifle, but that would only turn our attentions to our stomachs, lets face it, and Wild Goose Chase doesn't put it correctly either. How about divergence? Yes, that seems to fit. I wouldn't want to waste your time on a meaningless divergence (if you can think of a superior substitute send it on a post card) and I suppose it's not too late as this is a novel, not a poem, and we're merely a couple of pages in.

The short story forces one to be economical but nothing is wasted in a novel really, especially one put in the first person, as you always end up learning something about the character by the way it's written, and if you've read this far (praise your efforts) I can only assume that you're sufficiently bemused, amused, or otherwise entertained by my perceived quirkiness, or some other quality, to want to learn more about me. Only time will tell whether or not your optimism, which I am nonetheless thankful for, is misplaced.

I'm not different from most people, I don't suppose. Not that different from you most likely. Perhaps a little more posh, although I try not to let it show. But this is how we operate isn't it? If we aren't enjoying our experience we escape into our thoughts, don't we? We could be anxious or worried, maybe hurt, emotionally or physically. It's so easy to ignore a back pain, for instance, until it becomes unbearable.

Then there are some of us who do the same thing in the opposite way. They obsess over the little particulars of the situation. All the little details. And speculate what they'll do in this situation or that. 'If they say this, then I'll say this.' - 'I won't let them get away with doing that again. I'll tell them straight this time.' But that's still avoiding the experience of the moment. That's trying to anticipate the future, or as many of possible futures as their mind can muster, but there's no end to it really. No real solutions to be had ahead of time. Every question brings up a hundred more questions. You think that you can figure it out but you can't, because the mind is like the trunk of a tree, and thoughts are like branches coming out of the trunk, or roots, and the more they grow the more other branches can grow out of them, and the more branches can grow off the branches, and then leaves off that one, and then sinews off the leaves, and on and on into infinity. They're like a sequence of numbers that can keep going on, that can keep growing indefinitely. See if you can recognise the pattens in these ones:

0 1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21 34 55 89 144 …

01101001100101101001011001101001...

ok that one's admittedly quite tough, let me make it easier for you,

01 0110 01101001 0110100110010110 ...

and this one:

3.1415926535897932384626433832795028841971693993751...

That last one is pi by the way, and if you managed to find a pattern you're probably be due a nobel prize because top scientists haven't found one yet and likely never will, but I put it in to make sure you were paying attention, and to amuse myself mostly. It didn't work, but it did help me to continue procrastinating, and therefore avoid speaking about my problems while increasing the tension in the narrative and possibly eliciting a laugh all in one fell swoop. 

See I like to think that I know what I'm doing with this writing business otherwise I probably wouldn't be trying it out, such is the bent of my nature, but I don't want to grow tiresome, so I'll return to the story. Well, what little of it I was able to depart from.

So, I'm taking the train into Portsmouth. I've always liked taking the train. It affords a certain comfort which the bus lacks, but, it's more expensive as it so happens. Also, you can read on the train, but you can't on the bus, which, being as I am, I am doing of course in an attempt to distract my attention from my thoughts and what I'm feeling, not that I'm having much luck focussing on either, unsurprisingly. The words just rattle in my head emptily as my mind goes off in a tangent, and I find myself reading the same passage over and over again.

I've not long since left work in Southampton. I work in a legal office. No, I'm not a lawyer as it so happens and I'd thank you not to presume! I'm sorry, it's a bit of a touchy subject really. You see, I know that like most people you probably assumed that because I'm smart, fairly polite, a little cultured, and very well spoken (need I add modest?) that I probably have a glamorous job like be the editor of a newspaper, or at least a university professor. Or more likely a lauded upper-middle-class profession like a lawyer or a doctor, but life doesn't always work out that way. The truth is I'm just an assistant.

It's not that I think there's anything wrong with working in a place like this, honestly I don't. I'm not a snob. I was just hoping to be doing something a bit more personally fulfilling with my life by this age, or at least on the way there by now. Yes, I know I'm only twenty-six, but sometimes I honestly feel like my life's already over. I don't meant to seem melodramatic, but I just can't see a way out of the routine for me. 

I finished my art degree in   , the after a year out travelling I did my masters in fine art at . That's where I met Rich by the way, while I was doing my masters, not travelling, if I wasn't clear enough. Then I figured I'd make some cash while I tried to figure out what I wanted to do next and just kind of got stuck here.

Yes, it's the kind of job where you leave your work at the office at the end of the day and don't have to take it home, but I'm usually just so knackered by the time I get there that I just want to make some dinner, watch a DVD, then go to bed, not to speak of even doing any art which I hardly ever do now. And it's getting more and more stressful. More and more they have me making outbound calls to tell people things they don't like hearing and I don't like telling them.

A year after I left uni Andy and I broke up and now it's about a year after that. Yes, I know I called him Rick last time, but I've decided to change his name periodically on the off chance that you know him or worse, grow attached to him and therefore become biased in his favour, even if it is in part because you perceive me to have some quality that annoys you, such as scattyness (although I don't know where you'd get that idea from.) Next time I should call him Tony and see where it goes from there. Or perhaps because I remind you of some quality you have in yourself which you are against. It happens you know. It's called projection, or externalisation or something like that, and it's something to do with Carl Jung's concept of the shadow. He was a student of Freud's but they fell out because Jung disagreed with some of Freud's wackier theories, and then came up with some of his own such as the idea that everyone is linked by a collective unconscious and that when you die you become part of it or something like that. 

Look, I understand that because I'm the one telling the story you're invariably going to be somewhat biased by virtue of hearing it from my end, but it is my story after all, and I'd like you to sympathise with me first, if you can. I suppose I just want you to like me, is that so wrong? Surely it's a compliment if anything. I promise to try and be as impartial as possible, and here, as an act of contrition, let me do something brave and be straight with you. 

You know how I early told you that AnRickTonich only contacted me once to send me a thank you card up and till recently? I told you a sort of falsehood there. Well, yes, ok, that is just a nice way of saying I lied. I lied to you slightly. The thank you card was followed by a short letter.

Now before we go on, I acknowledge that I'm your one and only source of information on this account, and we need some trust here. If I lie to you the whole thing falls apart. You don't know what is real and what's false, and there's no actual story any more, just a ragtag fantasy mix of possible-truths, half-truths and doubtful uncertainties that don't make up a coherent or fair representation of anything at all. You can't make a fair judgement if I don't give a fair account. I understand that. But maybe you'll forgive me for being selective with the truth when I tell you want I omitted.

The letter said…

Hey, I wanted to thank you again for letting me stay when I needed to, 

you really made my life a lot easier and I appreciate that. 

I also have to say I was sorry you felt the need to treat me more like a

stranger in your house than the friend I would have liked to 

think I was. 

That really hurt.

I didn't write sooner was because I felt I should get my responsibilities out 

the way so I could give it my full attention, and I also wanted to make sure I

was feeling neutral before saying anything I might regret, but I figured you

could do with some space as well so I hope you have benefited from that and

don't think me rude.

I hope you're doing well and life is good for you,

best wishes,

Ebeneezer Algernon Lauri-Adams Sinclair Bain

Now how do you suppose I responded to a letter like that?

I didn't obviously.

5 Days of The Fringe left.

5 days of The Fringe left. 5 days to see all the shows you don't want to miss. 5 days to hobnob with industry who's whos. 5 days to praise and confound actors, directors, stage managers, technicians, musicians, comedians and those who place themselves somewhere in between as "performance artists." 5 days to buy a bottle of wine for the person whose couch you've last been sleeping on. 5 days to compose a tune you "wrote during the Fringe in two-thousand and twelve man." 5 days to pick-up and say you got a shag when you least expected it. 5 days to heckle a comic and say you got away with it. 5 days to overhear two people saying it was "the best thing they've ever seen" and go see it only to realise they were high or being sarcastic. 5 days to fit it all in. 5 days until you can sit back on your couch and overcome from the cough you've developed from burning the candle at both ends. 5 days till you can turn your eyes to "other projects I've been putting off." 5 days till your feet start recovering. 5 days till you realise a month has passed in no time at all, and you left so much undone before you left. 5 days till reality sets in. 5 days till you realise reality is really not that different at all: just the same thing, with the same feelings, in a different place, with different people, doing different things. 5 days till you can finally relax, or so you tell yourself. 5 weeks before you start having dreams about doing it all again next year.

Recently Published Frigne Reviews:
Bitesize Chekhov @ Merchant's Hall
Salome @ Greenside
The Jhiva of Nietzsche @ The Surgeons' Hall
The Canterville Ghost @ Greenside
Candide @ Church Hill Theatre
Bereavement The Musical @ C Venues

I lead a second life in Edinburgh, does that not make me a Bunburyist?

Waking up on someone's couch during the fringe while working as a theatre critic, reviewers pass slung around neck, feels kind of like being a romanticised caricature of a romanticised caricature. 40 minute walk to first venue, then traversing the city in between shows for another day. Helloooooo Edinburgh Fringe, did I really say I need to get more exercise? Please don't put chicken samosas in a box that says vegetable samosas. I fear that after having sufficient to drink one might forget that they feel out of place... while the company becomes ever more aware! Thanks for being an awesome friend ♥ The Devil May Care! (but that doesn't mean I have to give a fuck.) Anyone in Edinburgh lend me 20 quid? pay you back on Tuesday or Wednesday. Wallet got nicked last nite. Damn I was really enjoying the Edinburgh fringe weather but seemingly the Hindus were right, and all things must pass. Why do theatre makers think we like resettings of classics in World War II? what exactly is giving of this bizarre signal that World War II is a compelling or original period to set Shakespeare or Sophocles in? Or anything for that matter? It's not! When they said: "Repent, Repent" : I wonder what they meant? The problem with ethics is that the only people really interested in learning about it are already good.

These are just some of the experiences one might have in August when in Edinburgh.

So I've been catching up on review writing today and it's been getting really fun now I'm in the swing of it. I don't always enjoy sitting down and getting started, but when I finish articles I'm often very pleased with my writing and the ways I've managed to get around my concerns of how to approach certain aspects of a production.

While I'm here I guess this would be as good a time as any to link you to the reviews I've written that have already been posted online, please enjoy :-)

The Improvised Musical @ C
Treasure Island @ C Too
Candida @ Assembly George Square
Suite Hope @ Dance Base
Kaya – Dream Interpreter @ Assembly George Square
Anybody Waitin’? @ Dance Base
Mod @ C ECA

Back at the Fringe, 2012!

It's good to be back. In a way it feels like I just came home.
As though yesterday was a Monday and last years Fringe was just before the weekend.

Already seen lots and have lots to write about, I have a much better system this year which means not having to constantly travel backwards and forwards across the city, all thought a little of that is all good. Know my way round a bit better as well.

Let's get it on.

Belated Fringe Reviews

Pirates of Penzance ****
Much Ado About Nothing ***

I sub-edited these for Caroline:
Scene of the Titans ****
Constance and Sinestra ***
13 - The Musical **

Yet More Fringe Reviews

Anton's Uncles ****
Alchemystorium ****
Homemade Fusion ****
I Love You Beause... ***
Little Shop of Horrors ***
Pollyanna meets Piaf ***
Rent **

Ok cool so here are some guidelines on reviewing I was handed and endow upon you for posterity, they have served me well: - Write in the present tense so much as possible, it makes for a more engagin read

- Avoid the use of "I" <- it's a strange one because we all have egos but it does serve a purpose, there are rare occasions where it's acceptable. Some sites liek BroadwayBaby have reviewers that always use it and they seem less professional. It's a bit silly on one level but that's how it goes.
- Personally I find having a "tack" or and angle to come at it from really helpful, some kind of overarching umbrella that eveything fits into - 200-500 words, but closer to 200 is better that closer to 500, that's the skinny policy because apparently people don't read longer articles online they will stop halfway through, I used to always write nearer to 500 first but I've become more economical over the fringe, partly because I had to becasue I'm seeing so much and partly because I've learned to say what I need to say quicker I see 240-300 as ideal really
- read reviews! It really helps to see how other people are writing to see if you like it or not or if the way they are writing is good what makes it good, if bad, what makes it bad. But in the end it's about finding your own voice.

The Rules of Engagement:
- be polite to everyone, I know you'll have no problems with this
- Don't discuss the show with anyone in the venue or in ear shot of the venue
- Don't discuss shows publically (such as on facebook) until your review is up online, we each have varying levels of how comfortable we are with talking about stuff to close people like pals who might ask before it goes up. Gareth will almost never do it except with us, I've been known not to do it as well but during the year we don't have the writers privelages to put stuff up directly so it can take a while, we're working on trying to come to a compromise to sort that out.

I will subedit your articles before putitng them on the network, not much gets changed but I find having Gareth edit my work helps so hopefully you'll feel the same. Also if you want any mentoring in that process I will offer you feedback, only because I felt I didn't get enough when I started writing as a critic, I always felt out in the cold working on my own a bit so it's up to you, I don't consider myself an expert writer or anything but everyone has something valuable to say.

Superfun!




* insulting to very poor
** poor to average
*** above average to really very good
**** very good to excellent
***** life changing

More Fringe Reviews

Hitler! The Musical *****
Miracles at Short Notice ****
Jet Set Go ***
Nine ***
From The Fire ***
I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change **
Evil - The Musical **
11 **

In print in the Shimmy Skinny today!

My feature on Muscial Theatre was printed in the Shimmy Skinny today so hopefully people all over Edinburgh will be checking it out over a cup of coffee :-D you can catch it online here:

MUSICAL THEATRE

the idea for this feature was actually originally birthed on the 27th of June - I even wrote  a blog about it you can read it here.

Illich Sketch Show @ Pilot 4 during Edinburgh Fringe

So the Illich Sketch Show was performed live for the first time in the history of the world, ever, ever last night at the Flatrate event, Pilot 4.

Euan Sinclair had this to say on the matter:
"Our first live show was every bit as chaotic as you'd imagine, but Illich went down well with that Edinburger lot. And we performed a new sketch - written three days' previous - that we intend to inflict upon YOU!! ILLICH Hath Spoken."


My brother Jono drove us down from Glasgow and kicked around, even made a cameo appearance as Illich character Mad Dog MacGraw and friends Finn Townsley, Adrianna Polito, and others turned out to support. Yay.

The 10th installment of Illich will be up on youtube shortly. Exciting stuff.

Some Fringe Reviews

The Kist *****
Fresher The Musical *****
Actions **** written with Rebecca Paul
Linn Lorkin - Hey Piano Bar Lady ****
Apply Within ***
Spring Awakening ***
Sunday in the Park with George ***
Into The Woods **