For the first time, online performances have burst into the Brighton Fringe programme. From digital concerts, to innovative Zoom plays, musicals and more, here's our pick of some of the most interesting online shows that will challenge your perception of online theatre forever.
Find the online Brighton Fringe show that's right for you.
Theatre
Petrichor aims to take online viewing to another level with a full VR experience. Enter a dystopian reality, where nothing bad ever happens, but nothing good does either. With brilliant special effects, they stretch the medium to its limits in this experimental and immersive work.
Chesterfield, nestled in the quiet Derbyshire countryside, is much like any other market town, except that its church has a distinctive crooked spire. Join John, a carpenter who has come to Chesterfield to work on the spire, as death and intrigue follow this cursed project. The Crooked Spire – Windless Edition, based on the novel by Chris Nickson, is an online medieval murder-mystery musical that combines traditional tunes with contemporary idioms.
An Evening With Professor Edvard Von Goosechaser, 17th-century monsterologist (who somehow has access to the internet for this online show), will educate and entertain you through ghost stories and creepy tales, featuring demon-possessed poodles, ghostly armies, witches, wizards, monsters, and...cheese.
Food is such a large part of culture and life, that when Jenny and Frank’s daughter Sophie develops an eating disorder, they can’t understand why. OnComm commended Putney Theatre Company present Devil’s Food Cake, an online performance following a family's journey through therapy together.
A Mighty Fall From Grace might be Jake Thompson’s debut play, but it’s already won best play at a showcase event at the Lowry theatre in Salford in 2019. Reworked into an online show, this one hander tells the story of a diehard Bradford Bulls fan whose mental health deteriorates in tandem with the decline of his beloved club. Thompson combines his hard hitting subject matter with light-hearted comedic moments to explore schizophrenia and working class northern life.
It’s been a year since George Floyd was killed. But has it marked a turning point for change? Or it is another false dawn? What has changed for Black and Brown communities since? These questions are explored in Under Heaven’s Eyes, the new powerful solo performance from writer, performer and director of OFFIE Nominated Dream of a King, Christopher Tajah.
Am I A Terrible Person? For many living with mental health issues and neurodiversity, this question may be just another in a long line of intrusive thoughts. Uncompromising and autobiographical, this online event is a darkly comic and raw look at the mind of someone living with OCD and depression, and the stigma these conditions can bring.
Broken Link is the first OnComm Nominee of 2021. The play tells the story of four friends from a small town who meet every year to remember their closest friend, Ellie, who sadly committed suicide four years ago. It’s now 2020 and due to the pandemic their yearly meet is forced to be held on Zoom when an unexpected visitor joins the call: Ellie. Designed for Zoom as an immersive theatre experience, this bone-chilling play hopes to shock you with its story of betrayal.
You’ll have probably heard of Jane Eyre, but what of her creator’s own love story? Charlotte Brontë Snares the Suitor tells the real life story of Charlotte’s romance with Arthur Bell Nicholls, a local curate. In this comedy interpretation, the family servant Tabby has to become the matchmaker as the tempestuous would-be lovers finally make their way to a happy ending.
Ghislaine|Gabler takes Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler and uses it as a framework to analyze socialite Ghislaine Maxwell, the partner of the late Jeffrey Epstein, financier and convicted sex offender. By exploring the way these two women are uncannily similar, this formidable performance looks to explore what makes one person a victim, and another a monster.
Musicals & Cabaret
Discover the stories of the Brighton women of laundry hill area in Clean: The Musical. Giving voices to women from 1880 to 2021, with a musical twist, this online performance puts a spotlight on themes of suffrage, sexuality, abuse, and even the smallpox outbreak in 1950, which draws lines with our current Covid-19 pandemic.
Live and online, direct from Estonia, Dicey-Online is different every performance as multidisciplinary artist Dan le Man runs through a cabaret act like no other.
Music
A powerful exploration of Indigenous experiences, RECKŌNING “Te Waiata Paihere Wairua - The Sounds of Woven Souls” is a cross cultural, multi-art form performance, which brings together original song writing and personal experiences from Aotearoa, New Zealand and Te Whēnua Moemoeā (Land of the Dreamtime) Australia in this atmospheric recorded performance.
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