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The Fringe Blog - Sort Of! (1)Dateline: 14th August, 2005The long-range weather forecast on the Web said showers, so I was prepared. I remembered last year when it only seemed to stop raining when I was inside so I had my waterproof ready to put on at ten seconds' notice. No need! It was bright and sunny as I dragged my little suitcase on wheels out of Waverley Station and up Cockburn Street. I swear that street gets steeper every year! It was 10.30am and I couldn't get into my digs until 5.30pm, so I headed straight to the Fringe Press Office to pick up my press pass - and went to the wrong place. I went to where it was last year - or was it the year before? I know it wasn't the year before that, because then it was on the other side of the High Street. The Fringe Press Office is highly mobile! Anyway, I found the right place, persuaded tham to let me leave my bag there and went in to see Tim who hands out the press passes. The first thing I saw was our very own Philip Fisher collecting tickets for the 500 shows he intended to see in the next 24 hours (I kid you not - well, not much: that man manages to cram more into a day than the rest of us do in three!). Then my unerring instinct for food led me to notice that every member of the press office staff were eating huge sticky buns. I closed my eyes and tried not to let my envy show. I'd been very clever this year: I'd emailed my ticket requests to the venues in advance so I didn't have to wait around in the press office, so Philip and I headed off to the Pleasance Press Office in the Pleasance Dome which, for the last couple of years, has been the BTG's unofficial headquarters (thanks Dan, Will and Pam!). They have nice comfortable armchairs and sofas and it's an oasis of calm amid the madness which is the Edinburgh Fringe. I collected out my Pleasance tickets, Philip and I discussed our strategy for the next few days and then we headed off in different directions, me to the Pleasance Courtyard for my first show of the 2005 Fringe. The Courtyard is a great place: spend time there and you'll meet everyone you know at the Fringe, and you'll hear all the gossip! Needless to say one of the topics of conversation was Bill Burdett-Coutts' suggestion that it is time for the Fringe and the International Festival to unite. It is not a suggestion which has met with approval in any quarter, and certainly not in the conversations in the Courtyard. Some see it as a natural development of what they regard as the increasing commercialisation of the Assembly, Burdett-Coutts' venue, whilst others simply pooh-pooh it, paying no attention to what may motivate it. But if the One Fringe veteran remarked that the Assembly seems to be only interested in commercial success: big names for whose shows they can charge big bucks and make big profits. And certainly The Odd Couple seems to bear that out: the preview tickets were more expensive than the average Fringe show and prices for the run are £16 or £20, depending on the day - and I haven't been able to work out the reasoning for the differential: why should it cost £4 more to see the show on the 21st than it does on the 22nd? And prices do seem to be up all round. It is still possible to get non-preview tickets for £5 in some of the smaller venues, but £8.50 seems to becoming the average (based on a random selection of shows as listed in the Fringe programme: there's nothing scientific about it!) and an increasing number are £10 or more. This tends to fit with something my landlady said when we finally met at 5.30. There has always been a division between the town and the Festivals - Edinburgh people, she says, were really furious when the Fringe Society decided to part company with the EIF and start a week earlier, thus extending the Festival period by a week (although nowadays it's nearer an extra two weeks as Week 0, the preview week, gains popularity) - but with the increase in prices means that fewer can afford to go to the shows, thus distancing them further from the Festivals. It was interesting to hear a comment from Steve Lambert (Badac Theatre Company). It's five years since he was last at the Fringe and he was surprised at the predominance of comedy. And he wasn't just talking about stand-up: the number of comedy plays(and musicals) seems to be on the increase too. That made me check my schedule for my first three days: out of fourteen shows in a variety of venues, nine were comedies. I talked to an American who was visiting the Fringe for the 23rd time and he remarked upon it, saying that it was what he prefers: "All I want to do is laugh," he said. "I don't want violence or anything serious." >> Day 2
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