Welcome To The Madness That Is The Fringe

This morning I was awoken at the ungodly hour of 4am by the rumblings of my inner jet lag demon. Since breakfast at the hostel isn't served until 8am, what was I to do? I recalled the Fringe schedule booklet I'd picked up the night before and so, with my trusty map in hand and many different colored pens, I sat down to pick some shows to see for the day. Now, my understanding had been that the hefty pamphlet in my hand contained shows for the next week or so. My goodness was I ever wrong. Upon flipping through the pages, I realized that all 315 of them were full of shows playing ON WEDNESDAY. It completely boggled my mind. So I went through and circled everything that looked interesting, then went back and had to ruthlessly cull so I wouldn't be sitting in three separate venues at once. I grabbed tickets from the Fringe tent and set out on my adventure.

First: A production of Christopher Durang's Laughing Wild. I had rushed and rushed around the Royal Mile trying to find the venue and was terribly late, only to discover that it was an 11:15am, rather than 11am show. (This becomes a trend as time wears on, wait and see) The show itself was performed, to my surprise, by a Discordian theater company.

For those of you not familiar with this text, kindly look it up. And ask me to hand you a Pope Card next time we meet. The show itself was underwhelming, funny in parts, but a bit off. I dicovered that this was because the actor/company team (a man and a woman) were not quite clear on the subject of reality. Still, they had a good message, and for that I give them good wishes.

Next: A dash to The Underbelly (An awesome venue under a bridge) for The Leeds Tealights Comedy Revue. An undeservedly under-attended sketch show from five young men which was bloody fantastic. I hope their audiences grow over the course of the show. Highlights: Roxanne being performed by actors holding a) Rocks b) Sand c) A Red Lightbulb -- with electricity! and d) A Sword and Shield (See: Knight aka Night). Perhaps you needed to be there.

A bit of a repite for lunch. Had the most delicious sausage and mash at the Castle Tower Pub. Just the right thing for a hungry theatre-goer.

Then! One of many highlights of today: Bouncy Castle MacBeth (From the company who brought you Bouncy Castle Hamlet!) This was quite possibly the most innovative and completely bizarre production of the Bard I have ever seen. I don't really need to explain more, as the title says it all. But I should add that the inflatable Birnam Wood (Made of Palm Trees -- classy) was fabulous, as were the inflatable cactus, inflatable swords, and, in the most extreme case, inflateable Banquo! From the moment they inflated the entire contraption at curtain to its dramatic collapse at the end, I was laughing. It was too absurd.

While there, I spoke with a whole load of folks in shirts reading "The Matrix: The Pantomime!" I'd passed them earlier in the High Street and had immediately written down the show as a must-see. For those of you reading this who are unfamiliar with the Pantomime (It's a British thing) it's a tradition over here involving a variety of fairy tales which are all adapted to more or less the same story line, a Dame Bloke in a dress. Excuse me, many dresses. Many outrageous dresses.)(See:, and a lot of audience participation (See: Shouting). So the next time someone shouts "Hello Boys and Girls!" at you at deafening volume, be prepared for a good time.

I had just enough time to catch the Panto before the swing concert I was already booked for. So off to the Fringe Office to buy a ticket. I got in line at 6:15, the show was at 7. By 7:55 I had finally made it through the line and was racing towards the Underbelly, listed on my handy, and now very well-loved (See: Mostly destroyed) map. I skidded in only to realize that the venue was on top of the bridge, whilst I was below it. So UP THE STAIRS! I charged up six flights and emerged onto the bridge. After a few false starts in the wrong direction -- it was now a few minutes after 7 -- I fianlly got to the right place. It was 10 after. I was sure it was too late. However, this time, the show was not at 7:30 instead of 7, but had been held up by some glitch, and I thankfully joined the full que of people waiting to get in. The show was pretty fantastic. Corny, full of bad puns, a few songs, silly costumes, and some really horrible American accents. References were well-placed and sometimes agonizingly set up. One of my favorites: (As Morpheus, Trinity, Cypher, and Neo sit down to eat soup for no apparent reason) Neo: Yeah, this is quite good. But why are we all eating it with forks? Morpheus: Because there are no spoons, Neo.

Imagine awful jokes like that for an hour. Oh yes, it was grand. And I sincerely mean that.

Luckily I had grabbed some sort of baconey cheese thing in pastry before going in, because I had to rush back to the hostel, shower, clean up, and run to clubWEST to see The Jive Aces, Britain's top Swing band. And the rush was worth it in every way possible. The only alarming element of the evening was that the band attributed their seemingly endless supply of energy (Which was impressive) to L. Ron Hubbard. I'd never heard of Scientology Swing before, but they were damn good. So I'm willing to overlook that discrepancy. I met some amazing dancers (Apparently there's an active swing scene in Edinburgh) and one of them -- who lived in Santa Barbara for six months, small world -- gave me his email so I could hear about any other upcoming events. We danced from 9:30 to midnight and had a total blast. If it wasn't their last night I'd definitely go again. It felt great to be back on the dance floor.

So here I am, exaughsted and happy, definitely not going to be suffering from jet lag tomorrow morning, and ready to move onto my next adventure -- meeting Violet Dalton, my host for the next two nights! I'm dropping bags with her tomorrow morning and will be on my own for the day before meeting her again at 6 when she gets off work. Very excited. (Have become Welsh.) Well, not really. My accent's getting all Scottish though, so that's fun. So yeh! Writing postcards like a fiend, but haven't had any time for stamps. Rectify that soon enough so most of you can expect post. Tomorrow is another day full of shows to see and places to explore.

Till the next carrier pidgeon brings me more 20p bits,
Lucy