Articles by Alice Quine

Mark Billingham and My Darling Clementine: The Other Half

Crime writer Mark Billingham and country band My Darling Clementine come together for The Other Half, a blend of storytelling and music about love, loneliness and broken promises. From behind a lectern, Billingham tells the story of Marcia, a waitress in a rundown bar in Memphis...

BARBU Electro Trad Cabaret

One man shouldn't be able to hold two men on his shoulders at the same time. Two women shouldn't be able to function as skipping ropes. Hamsters weren't made to be performers. But that is what happens in Barbu Electo Trad Cabaret, as Cirque Alfonse produce a mesmerising and deliciously bonkers fanfare of strength, agility and beards...

Nell Gwyn: An Epilogue

Review
★★★
Edinburgh Fringe
Sweet Grassmarket
27th Aug, 2015

This one-woman show presents Nell Gwyn, mistress of King Charles II, as she regales the audience with her lot in life – actor, lover and whore. Since catching the King's attention, she reconsiders her roles on-stage and off, and the relationship between the two...

The Furies

Review
★★
Edinburgh Fringe
C venues - C nova
26th Aug, 2015

Durham's Ethrael Theatre presents a musical adaptation of Aeschylus's The Furies, a tale of vengeance, honour, justice and mercy. The Furies, representing the angry, the grudging and the avenger, chase Orestes for his blood after he displays has what a famous Austrian psychiatrist might call 'parental issues' – he killed his mother Clytemnestra, who had killed his father Agamemnon...

Charlie Baker: Just the One

Charlie Baker blends song with stand-up, as he intersperses his versions of one hit wonders with tales from his life. He relishes sprinkling Joe Dolce's Shaddup Your Face and DJ Piper's Do You Really Like It? inbetween grown-up content such as parenthood and the successes and tribulations of a long haul marriage, in a way which comes across vaguely arbitrary, completely barmy and lots of fun...

Harriet Kemsley: Puppy Fat

Review
★★
Edinburgh Fringe
Pleasance Courtyard
25th Aug, 2015

Kent-native Harriet Kemsley takes a juvenile look at an adult world, as she describes fitting into the grown up sphere of sex, porn, drugs and flat-sharing with child-like naivety, enthusing about vegetarian Haribos and Jumanji...

Papa CJ: Naked

Papa CJ takes the audience through chapters of his life, with the idea of simultaneously removing metaphorical and physical layers, as he strips in front of us. Brought up in India with a working class background, he guides us through dark periods of his life, alongside lighter observational anecdotes...

Cheque Please

Review
★★★
Edinburgh Fringe
Zoo
21st Aug, 2015

Cheque Please centres on Ivy, who describes herself as a high-functioning depressive, as she endures her job as a waitress with a boss who is constantly threatening dismissal. A colleague's suicide triggers a further breakdown, stripping her thin veneer of tolerance for work, relationships and life...

Jack Heal: Frankenstein's Love Monster

This show has a bad title. Normally, this wouldn't warrant a mention – after all, what's in a name? – but for a show as wonderfully, wittily and whimsically wordy as this, phrasing matters...

Devil's Door Bell

In her stand up show The Devil's Door Bell, Njambi McGrath presents an hour of satirical shaming, teasing the audience into reflecting on colonialism's legacy in Africa.. Trilingual McGrath opines on cultural identity and her upbringing in “Second World” Kenya with warmth, humour and a resigned anger, covering topics from farming, family life and teenage pregnancy to female genital mutilation, kidnapping and Al Shabaab...

Moby Alpha

Seattle comedy duo Charles (Chuck Armstrong and Charlie Stockman) present an imaginative, original and witty comedy, using physical theatre, sharp word play, and absurdism to launch Moby Dick into space, because, well, why not? Using the bones of Melville's story, the pair journey through culture and humanity past, present and future...

Flamin' Dames Sing Coward and Novello

The show explores a selection of songs by Noël Coward and Ivor Novello through humour, glamour and elegance, as the Flamin' Dames Helen Whittington and Hilary Fisher combine music with pieces of storytelling and theatre...

Lisa-Skye: Bunny and Mad Dog Get High

In Australian comedian Lisa-Skye's “love letter to the sex-and-drug-soaked 70s” she tells the tale of Melbourne hedonism in the 1970s star-crossed hippy lovers Bunny and Mad Dog...

Big Value Comedy Show - Early

Big Value Comedy Show (Early) promises two hours of comedy gold with four young stars of tomorrow.Amiable compere Freddie Quinne ambles through and warms up the crowd, with quick but unthreatening audience participation...

An Evening with Richard Michael and Family

Scotsman Richard Michael leads his talented family on piano with his daughters Hilary Michael on violin and saxophone, Joanna Duncan on violin and xylophone, and nephew Paul Michael on bass...

Political Animal – Scottishreferendogeddon 2014

Compere Andy Zaltzman sets up the evening by asking the audience who is a no and who is a yes, wondering aloud if political comedy has any capacity to effect change and promising a concluding audience referendum...

Dirty Decadence

Review
★★★
Edinburgh Fringe
C venues - C nova
21st Aug, 2014

Exeter University's Theatre With Teeth brings their modern ballet to Edinburgh, presenting the story of three couples and a maid on a weekend away. This alcohol-fuelled partner-swapping, sexually-confused, weekend is not so much bohemian Bacchanalia but an orgy of aristocratic entitlement ending in tragedy...

A Roaring Accordion

A Roaring Accordion brings Strangely Doesburg's promise of a “rollicking, sing-along, one-man cabaret-riot” to the top deck of the bus in the Free Sisters.Doesburg has an impressive voice, a sort of anti-folk/punk boom that is rich and oddly majestic...

Spectacappella!

King’s College London's All the King's Men return to the Edinburgh Fringe with Spectacappella. The ten-piece all-male group are full of vitality, precision and wit as they perform a variety of songs re-imagined through a cappella...

A Midsummer Night's Dream: The Rock Musical

Review
★★
Edinburgh Fringe
C venues - C
17th Aug, 2014

Infinity Repertory Theatre update Shakespeare's comedy to the 21st century as a musical with a rollicking rock’n’roll aim in mind. Lysander and Dmitri (Demetrius) spar with cardboard guitars and compete with fancy cars; lovers won't return calls and Hermia fears getting grounded...

11 Films to Happiness

Review
★★
Edinburgh Fringe
Ciao Roma
14th Aug, 2014

Brighton-based Aidan Goatley returns to Edinburgh with a show based on the premise of his favourite “comfort food films”, taking in such blokey titles as The Avengers, The Magnificent Seven, and Ferris Bueller's Day Off, and pausing to take in the supposed wonders of Jason Statham...

The Bevvy Sisters

Scotland-based four-piece group The Bevvy Sisters (not all sisters, or even all women) enthrall and amaze as they bring us their unique stamp on Americana classics and their own songs...

The Quintessential Anthology of Gin

Hendrick’s brand ambassador for Northern Europe Duncan McRae takes us through a “cocktail of cultural and curious occurrences,” as he informs the audience about the world of gin, from its cultural history through to its scientific make-up and how it's made...

Random Acts

Combining different dance styles including ballet, jazz, tap and modern, The Houston City Dance Company use wit and pathos in eight different pieces, using six female dancers and three different choreographers...

Up the Auntie

Review
★★
Edinburgh Fringe
C venues - C nova
12th Aug, 2014

Cambridge University troupe The Foxymorons promise their sketch show Up the Auntie will be a “ludicrous abandon” of “porn, politics, pheasants and porn”, but their failure to deliver on two of these (porn makes an appearance) is unfortunately not the only thing lacking nor their self-description the only thing needlessly padded...

Orkestra Del Sol

Established Edinburgh favourites Orkestra del Sol present a show of Balkan-inspired brass and visual spectacle infused with a love of theatricality.The nine musicians on-stage are incredibly talented and make it look easy...

Jonny Pelham and George Zach - Subtitles Not Provided

Jonny Pelham is affable and tells some thoughtful stories about his life, with original punchlines, great timing, and a good sense of narrative. His perspective on the world, such as musings prompted by watching a pigeon eat ice cream, alongside his cynical tone, is imaginative and humorous...

Lace Up

Lace Up presents the rise of one man, Stuart, from a childhood of neglect to dominance in the boxing ring, with the help of his brother (trainer and lifelong advocate Teddy) and his promoter (Omaha-bred Jack, whose role it is to help Stuart ‘break’ America and gain HBO sponsorship)...

Best of the Fest Daytime

An undemanding hour spent with a showcase variety of acts.The Bristol-born compere John Robins ambles along with a pleasant family-friendly routine, and quick, unthreatening interplay with the audience...

Paradise Lost

Montreal-based Paul van Dyck brings imagination and passion to this polished one-man telling of John Milton's Paradise Lost. Using puppetry, computer visuals, music and an incredible variety of voices, he is a masterful storyteller who makes Milton's 17th century epic accessible and relevant...

Manuelita

Manuelita uses physical theatre, music, storytelling and comedy to tell the story of the lover and co-strategist of Latin America's 19th century revolutionary Simon Bolivar, Manuelita Saenz...

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