More Fringe

I had to do a wee smidgeon of work this morning, then I headed out late morning for a day at the Fringe.

Fringe show 3: The curse of Elizabeth Faulkner (3*)
A play about an Edwardian undertaker who gets caught up in a quest to rid his family of a curse. I think this could be best described as a caper. A dark-ish farce-ish play. I watched it quite happily and was consistently amused. Nice characters, decent interpretation. Nothing ground-breaking but no problems with it. Good, for what it was.

Fringe show 4: Sincerely, Mr Toad (4.5*)
I love musicals, I have seen around ten million musicals in my time, and I absolutely loved this one. This musical is based around the life of Kenneth Grahame and it interweaves the challenges in his family relationships and working life with his eventually fulfilled ambitions of writing Wind in the Willows. The resulting musical is magical and tragic, underpinned with both hope and impending doom, which makes for a powerful story. Keith Jack (from TV’s Any Dream Will Do) was really good as Kenneth’s son as one would expect (well I would) but Adam Venus playing Kenneth Grahame was a real highlight. A beautiful and emotional but understated performance. In the technical side I think the set was good and they made good use of it, but at the performance I saw they hadn’t got the sound levels quite right.

Fringe show 5: Ballad of the burning star (3.5*)
This performance was described to us as a story about the conflict in Israel narrated by a drag queen. I guess it was that, but it was more as well. Dark and complicated and not your usual method of storytelling. Along with the main narrator, the story is interpreted – mainly though dance - by a troop of ladies in sexy military uniform. Gorgeous costumes, and very very slick. The performance jumps between the telling and the interaction between the narrator and her troop. It is a harrowing tale, and it becomes more so. I find it hard to know how to judge something like this, I’m certain it won’t be for everyone in terms of its style or subject matter. And I’m not sure it was for me, I wouldn’t say I enjoyed it (and I generally like the deep and dark stuff). But. It was extremely competent and different and interesting.

Fringe show 6: The Noise Next Door - Soundhouse (4*)
The Noise Next Door are a group of five guys who do improvised comedy and music. Of the improv I’ve seen these guys are my favourite – straight down the line without pretention or studentyness, just consistently good. We’ve seen them a couple of times before. This year the Noise Next Door’s show has a broad narrative based in a fictional cabaret show and the sketches are made up around the people that work in the theatre. I thought as a concept it worked extremely well, I really liked that a lot. The performance was solid – perhaps not the best I’ve ever seen, but I’d put that down to the audience suggestions more than the act itself.

Fringe show 7: Amateur Transplants - Adam Kay is going for a number one (4.5*)
I saw Adam Kay last year and enjoyed his show so thought I’d go back. Adam sings and plays the keyboard, changing the lyrics to popular songs. This year the theme was Christmas and the stage was all decked out with lights and a tree. Adam is a great performer, I think best described as sardonic but very likeable. His songs are funny and usually offer a little bit more than the usual parodies with clever wordplays, unexpected twists and interesting ways of taking advantage of the music to enhance the phraseology. The Spandau Ballet one was genius. I think that this show would appeal to a lot of people and I really couldn’t fault it, other than to say that there was more crossover with his last show than I would have liked and I expected to see more new material.

Fringe show 8: Claudia O’Doherty - Pioneer (4*)
Completely coincidentally I’d scored free tickets to see Claudia O’Doherty the last two years and enjoyed her stuff, although it has been very very weird character comedy before. Last year Claudia was nominated for a big an award and (I suspect as a consequence) she’s packed out a fairly big venue. I was a bit unsure how that might go down as I really did not think her show would have a broad appeal. Well, this year Claudia’s show was a narrative about herself (or a character of herself) which I think made it much more accessible whilst retaining the integrity of the original with the same confident / awkward delivery. It had a wonderful sadness and desperation running though it, it was pathetic and complicated. Painful to watch. Dry. Funny. It was very very well done. With great SFX.