For the first time since 2012, Northern Stage will not be participating in the Edinburgh Fringe, showcasing northern companies but, as ever, a number of NE companies are making their own way to Edinburgh.

These are the ones who have let us know they’re going:

  • Be More, Do Better But Don't Change
    Written and performed by Roisin Crowley Linton (Newcastle)
    Underbelly, Bristo Square (Venue 302)
    1 – 27 August @ 21:50

    A blend of poetry, stand-up and personal story-telling about romantic love and heartbreak and why we prioritise it above all else.

    Roisin is bored of pretending that falling in love is fun. It's boring and sweaty and embarrassing and tragic and she thinks it's her civic duty to talk about it to anyone who will listen. It's just like having a chat in the pub with your best friend, if your best friend drank her wine too quick and told her intimate secrets to a room full of strangers.

  • Walton-Gunn Productions (South Tyneside)
    The Big Time
    By Wayne Miller
    C royale, George Street
    1 - 25 August (excluding 14) @ 14:45

    When two criminal buffoons take a shot at the big time, and take a girl to a cabin in the woods for the Organisation, this kidnapping gone wrong spirals into a night of comic disaster.

  • Newcastle University Theatre Society
    Big Trouble in Little Monkey's Daycare
    By Joe Hodgson
    theSpace on the Mile (Venue 39)
    3 – 11 August @ 18:10

    Four-and-a-quarter-year-old Tommy is a hard-boiled private investigator on the mean streets of Little Monkey's Daycare. With strong and silent partner Bobby, the duo set out to uncover a plot that seems to go right to the top of the playground, which is admittedly not very high at all.

  • Door-to-Door Poetry
    Written and performed by Rowan McCabe
    Bourbon Bar (Venue 333)
    4 - 25 August (not 15) at 13:30

    What do you think would happen if you knocked on a stranger's door and offered to write them a poem? Rowan McCabe is the world's first Door-to-Door Poet. Through a funny and thought-provoking mix of spoken word and theatre, find out about his journey around the North East of England.

  • Spontaneous Wrecks (Newcastle)
    Improvised Comedy
    Ciao Roma, 64 South Bridge (Venue 283)
    18 - 25 August at 13:35

    Spontaneous Wrecks returns to PBH’s Free Fringe for the third year running, performing scenes and playing games made up on the spot. Everything they do is inspired by audience suggestions, which means every show is completely different—and anything can happen.

  • Woolly Sheep Theatre Company (North Yorkshire)
    Not Dead Yet!
    By Rob Wilson
    theSpace on North Bridge, Fife Theatre (Venue 36)
    3 & 4 and 6 to 11 August @ 14:40

    A new play challenging the audience to examine their preconceptions about memory loss. In particular, they examine the roles of humour and music through real-life stories.

  • Elliott Mann (Hexham, Northumberland)
    The Penniless Optimist
    Written and performed by Elliott Mann
    theSpace on the Mile (Venue 39)
    13 - 25 August (not 19) @ 18:20

    Trapped in a TV box world, Po is on a quest to retrieve his one and only worldly possession, his optimistic hat. But, misled by the noise and temptations of modern life, can he break free from the soundtrack society has written for his life and hear the music once more? A loud, energetic show, packed full of music, dancing, juggling, mayhem and meaning.

  • Jade Byrne in Association with LittleMighty (Darlington)
    Pricks
    Written and performed by Jade Byrne
    Pleasance Courtyard - The Cellar
    Every day except Wed 8, 15 and 22 @ 14:15

    Jade's had over 70,000 pricks... of the medical kind and this is a chance to set the record straight about type 1 diabetics like her. She's not bankrupting the NHS. And she can eat cake, a whole bloody cake if she wants to.

  • Less is MORE productions (Middlesbrough)
    Stella
    By David Tuffnell
    PQA Venues at Riddle's Court (Venue 277)
    3 – 16 August @ 16:00

    It's the annual social club trip for a group of knicker factory workers from Industrial Middlesbrough, busy enjoying the sights, sounds and smells of Northern Ireland's Coast. Though separated in age, these three women are united in desire, desperation, passion and regret.

    Inspired by an old photograph writer David Tuffnell discovered whilst clearing out his aunt's house, which painted a very different picture of the auntie he had known and loved—one filled with dreams, desires and an unquenched thirst for life.

  • The Georgian Theatre Royal Youth Theatre (Richmond, N Yorks)
    This Is Yorkshire
    By Aimee Shields
    theSpace on The Mile – Space 3 (Venue 39)
    20 - 24 August @ 17:15

    A new play examining working class life in early '80s Yorkshire through the eyes of a 12-year-old boy who becomes embroiled in two very different skinhead gangs, this coming-of-age tale uses music and humour to comment on the harsh reality of the xenophobia and racism still experienced by immigrants today.

  • Newcastle Theatre Royal, The Drive Project and The Royal British Legion presents Bravo 22 Company
    Unspoken
    By Gary Kitching
    Pleasance Beyond (Venue 33)
    21 – 27 August @ 16:15

    Bravo 22 Company's new drama brings to light the lives interrupted and forever changed by war, on a heart-wrenching and hilarious journey of love, loss, loneliness and hope, performed by ex-service personnel and based on the stories of 100 wounded, injured and sick service personnel, veterans and their family members.