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Reflections of a Tired ManPhilip Fisher reflects on his experiences of this year's Edinburgh fringeDateline: 31st August, 2003It is quite nice to have someone supply a sense of perspective. At the end of my thirteen days in Edinburgh, I had managed asked to see 61 plays and reviewed the lot. In addition, I put five poor victims through interviews some of which are still to be published and will appear next week or so. Verging on exhaustion at the beginning of this week, it was nice to meet one of The Stage's Edinburgh crew who had seen some excess of 100 shows and also a national newspaper journalist who had 88. We all seemed to come to the same conclusion, which is that while there was a lot of good and very good Theatre in Edinburgh this year, there were very few of the really exceptional shows that have characterised the Festival and Fringe in recent years. The International Festival had one of the undoubted highlights, Peter Stein's new production at the King's Theatre of The Seagull with a starry cast led by Fiona Shaw and Michael Pennington. Backing this up were Calixto Bieito's modern-dress Hamlet and David Greig's reflective new play, San Diego. It would be nice to feel that each of these will tour and thus reach wider audiences, though, for various reasons, it may well be that none of them reaches London although Hamlet is travelling to Birmingham and San Diego to Glasgow. The first Fringe stop for most serious theatregoers is the Traverse. It is devastating to report that they have given up on the cheap single malt whiskies in the bar, which may have coloured some reviewers' opinions. Strangely, the pick of the Traverse bunch this year was performed in a public lavatory at the end of a dark alley, known as Traverse 4. Ladies and Gents was by far the most atmospheric production in Edinburgh and overrode its rather murky location and unoriginal plot to become a great experience. If the Traverse press office is to be believed, the toilets were actually in use up to six each evening with shows commencing at 7.15. The production credits should certainly have included the cleaners. In the main building, the best three plays were both written by locals. The People Next Door by Henry Adam opens at the Theatre Royal Stratford East next week and is a witty comedy that addresses contemporary political issues in an very interesting and oblique way. Dark Earth by David Harrower shows how difficult it is for Town and Country to interact. Following Gagarin Way, hopes were very high and for Gregory Burke's new play, The Straits, set during the Falklands war and investigating the lives of teenagers on the point of growing up. This one will be coming to Hampstead in the autumn. Amongst imports, Playing the Victim, which is immediately transferring to the Royal Court, is a comedy calling on the skills of the Presnyakov Brothers' writing, Richard Wilson's directing and physical acting company, Told by an Idiot. Nine Parts of Desire by Heather Raffo is a one-woman show destined for the Bush later this month. It gives insights into lives of Iraqi women and, under Mike Bradwell's wise hand in London, could become much more powerful. Challenging the Traverse for quality productions this year were the Assembly Rooms. In the past, they have tended to have both good and bad but in 2003, the standard was extremely high in many cases. Liz Lochhead's Thebans was extremely exciting distillation of five Greek tragedies and a worthy successor to her Medea. Of equally high standing was the New Zealand-Indian import, Pickle, a comedy with a real heart. Two of the strongest pieces of physical theatre, The Argument by Theatre O, at the Barbican this week, and Cry Wolf, a hilarious reworking of the Little Red Riding Hood story, showed the Assembly Rooms at its best. They also had the big names, no fewer than 12 of them performing together in Guy Masterson's new production of Twelve Angry Men. Mr Masterson himself reprised his excellent one-man Under Milk Wood at Assembly Rooms offshoot in the converted St George's Church. They also welcomed 78th St Lab, collectors of Fringe Firsts, who brought half-a-dozen plays to Edinburgh including the moving Boy Steals Train, an adventurous, one-man Moby Dick by Carlo Adinolfini and Broadway sensation, Def Poetry Jam. The other big venue with loads of plays was Pleasance with its two locations. The 2003 First of the Firsts played there, Adriano Shaplin's satire on American imperialism, The Pugilist Specialist by the wonderfully professional Riot Group. They also had the best comedy of the year, the transfer from the Old Red Lion in London of Melanie Tait's Vegemite Tales and the touching Julian Garner play, Cyril's Little Moments of Weakness and Strength. Perhaps this year's strangest play, The Typographer's Dream by Adam Bock which eschewed a plot in favour of presenting three ordinarily eccentric characters was also on offer at Pleasance. More surprisingly, the Mill Hill School production of Steven Berkoff's Kvetch proved to be a teen sensation with an extremely talented young company. The Gilded Balloon has recovered incredibly from its fire during the winter. A relatively small sample came up with two great comedies, Malachi Bogdanov's Bill Shakespeare's Italian Job arriving at almost exactly the same time as a new film version (of The Italian Job) and Henry Naylor's political comedy with a hidden punch, Finding Bin Laden. C venues have been growing in strength and size for some years and has the reputation has improved, so has the programming. They had no fewer than three plays by the Australian Van Badham, together with several little gems including the fifteen minute-long Toast by Katy Slater delivered from a stepladder and nominated for an award by the besotted Stage reviewer, the very original Bluebeard's Women and a really brave version of the late Sarah Kane's Cleansed. Further, they had the Australian drama, The Return, that was so close to being a great play and for the third year on the trot, Saul Reichlin's reincarnation of Sholom Aleichem and his characters. Around the rest of the Fringe, there was the usual mix of good, bad and worst of all, indifferent. Into the first category came up the extremely bloody Kaos Titus Andronicus at the Gateway Theatre and Tonight We Fly, a life of the artist, Marc Chagall by Trestle Theatre at George Square. Thanks to all of the press offices that have made life so easy and apologies to all those who had been missed out either because the memory fails or there was not enough time to see their shows. The hope is that many of these will travel down to London and, given notice, the British Theatre Guide will endeavour to review them there. Articles Indices:
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