Yes, it's that time again when we take our annual pilgrimage north of the border into the cultural chaos that is the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. And this year's choice of shows was even more eclectic than last's.
For a start the first venue was Edinburgh's Cineworld; not an obvious choice, but it was to see a rather rare event - a nationwide live feed to selected cinemas from the David Bowie exhibition at the V&A. Having failed to even get near visiting this highly acclaimed look at this pop icon's life (booked out until eternity and now finished) this was a chance to get a taste of what we had missed and also witness a superb documentary about this extraordinary performer's life and work.
From there to laughs - the annual favourite 'Shakespeare For Breakfast', whose sub-title this year was 'The Reclaiming of the Shrew', wonderfully grafting the William and Kate story into the bard's comedy. And you gotta get a bit of stand-up in there too, this year in the motherly shape of Jenny Eclair, a comedienne I've been wanting to see live for soooo long. And man was she funny - so much so that at one point I nearly lost consciousness laughing so much - her menopausally obscene rantings striking a chord with many a woman of a similar age in the audience.
Lets not forget the art too, with superb exhibitions of the stylish photographs from Condé Nast (at the City Art Centre) and the wonderfully surreal work of Man Ray (at the Scottish Portrait Gallery). And then to musical theatre in the shape of the brilliant Kiss of the Spider-Woman - The Musical from the Musical Theatre Society, superbly staged and performed. Then to circus - the incredibly surreal but eye-poppingly spectacular show 'Noodles' from Cardiff based troupe extraordinaire NoFit State. I may well be avoiding that particular carbohydrate for some time after witnessing that...
But the highlight for me was the highly intimate two-hander 'between', written by Oskar Brown and directed by Geoffrey Hyland. Performed at 11.30 (that's p.m.) in a tiny space at the Surgeon's Hall off Nicolson Street the play unflinchingly focused on intimate relations between men, be they gay, straight or undecided. It was originally developed as a student production by Brown at the University of Cape Town Drama department and was then re-invented for Fringe productions with the help of multi-award winning director Hyland. Brown performs with fellow South African Nicholas Campbell amongst a sea of blue papers (which by the way were all of Shakespeare's 154 sonnets printed in various sizes) in various states of undress and physical proximity. The effect is sometimes unsettling given the closeness of the actors to the audience; the sense of voyeurism is palpable. But then that is the point, to be exposed to that intimacy no matter how uncomfortable it may be. A brilliant piece of minimal theatre.
And then, of course, there was all that was in between; the inevitable leaflet-strewn struggle down the Royal Mile, stopping for some over-priced tea at Patisserie Valerie (or Val's Cake Shop as we dubbed it), perusing the pissed punters on Grassmarket and meeting up with Barry for several pints at that old gay hang-out The New Town. A wonderful but woefully short visit.
Oh and update on the tram system; they have finished it! But no trams are running on it yet. Not until next year at least.
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