Articles by Sarah Virgo

Magic Hour

Paul Nathan is a name often associated with the I Hate Children Children’s Show, a firm Festival favourite for years amongst little ones, but he is back this year with a brand ne…

Ollie Horn: Pig in Japan

Occasionally you will see a TV star wandering the Festival crowds during August in Edinburgh, but at A Pig in Japan you can see real-life Japanese TV star, Ollie Horn perform his d…

Edinburgh-raised drag queen Ripley makes his Fringe debut this year with Like A Sturgeon. This is a perfect drag homage to some of the world’s leading females in politics. The show is perfectly lip-synced to an array of popular music, as well as Ripley’s own original lyrics...

Schalk Bezuidenhout: Leopard Print

Schalk Bezuidenhout steps out dressed like an East London hipster, all bright, quirky knits, socks printed with bananas and a distinguishable moustache and hairstyle. His look would imply that maybe we’re in for 40 minutes of millennial-observation, quips about being hipster but it couldn’t be further from this...

Lucille and Cecilia

“Arf, Arf, Arffff.” What do you mean you expected this performance to be in English? The first opening scenes of this original comedy from new writers Banging Average Theatre is entirely in sea lion, and completely, physically, bonkers...

Wrecked

There are a lot of innovative and unique venues at this year’s Festival, but Wrecked might be just one of the most original and weirdest, as this entire performance takes place in a battered up car...

Olga Koch: Fight

When you think of Russians, funny and comedian are probably not two words that instantly spring to mind; but in time, Olga Koch will change that. Her show is centred around the events of 2014 – when her father was stopped on the Russian border trying to board a plane to Germany...

Foxdog Studios: Robot Chef

FoxDog Studios are back – and they are as witty, quick and entertaining as previous years. Lloyd Henning and Peter Sutton make up the duo, who greet the audience clad in wires and electronic pads (that we soon discover are musical instruments, of sorts)...

Canoe

“Who are we, now that we don’t have kids?” Matthew Roberts performs as three key characters in this touching one-man performance: as two fathers, David and Tom, that lose their 9 and 11 year old children in a tragic accident; and as their adopted son, Andrew...

Alma, a Human Voice

Review
★★
Sarah Virgo
Edinburgh Fringe
Summerhall
6th Aug, 2018

Alma: A Human Voice is a one-person performance focused on portraying and contrasting two characters from the early 1900s. One of these is painter Oskar Kokoschka, who famously made a life-size doll of his former lover, and muse, Alma Mahler; the other is the main character in Cocteau’s Opera, La Voix Humaine, a heart-broken woman...

Baby Face

“Have you ever fantasised about someone like me?” Katy Dye asks the audience, not as an adult woman, not as a performance artist, but as a 15-year-old school girl. Dye’s performance, Baby Face, asks hard-hitting, uncomfortable questions about how we, as a society infantilise women...

Double Denim Duo on Working With not Against the Audience

Feature
Sarah Virgo
Edinburgh Fringe
8th Sep, 2017

Australian comedians Michelle Brasier and Laura Frew made their duo debut at this year’s Fringe as Double Denim, having previously performed as part of Backpack Anorak. Michelle and Laura met Broadway Baby’s Sarah Virgo over lunch to talk about their show this year, the first time they’ve worked as a duo and why Edinburgh is the only place to be as a comedian in August.

Fiona McNamara & Ralph Upton on their Approach to Audience Interaction

Feature
Sarah Virgo
Edinburgh Fringe
28th Aug, 2017

Binge Culture are a performance-art group of five that originated in Wellington, New Zealand. They’re always thinking about how to get the audience involved in their work and playing with forms outside of traditional theatre...

A Tale of Two

A topical and popular theme for this year’s Fringe – mental health – is explored and fleshed out in this beautiful, bittersweet tale of two childhood friends that battle to fight one of the pair’s inner demons...

Ami and Tami

Review
★★
Edinburgh Fringe
Underbelly, Cowgate
23rd Aug, 2017

Ami and Tami is a reimagined Hansel & Gretel for the modern day. This musical rendition takes the classic fairytale and catapults it into the 21st Century, making it more relevant and appealing for the whole family...

Locker Room Talk

Delve into an hour of real Locker Room Talk, a term made infamous by Donald Trump, and allow yourself to be immersed into the murky and dark world of everyday sexism that society doesn’t seem to want to admit to...

Chris Washington: Dream Big (Within Reason)

Chris Washington is an ordinary guy; he explains this to us from the very beginning. Nothing exciting or extraordinary or traumatic has happened to him - yet. As such, his stand up is just that - simple and non-traumatic yet also funny, relatable and heartwarming...

07800 834030: Thank You for Waiting

Review
★★★
Edinburgh Fringe
Sneaky Pete's
16th Aug, 2017

Miranda Kane's show, 07800 834030: Thank You For Waiting returns to the Edinburgh Fringe for more secrets, confessions and answers – the dirtier the better.The show does what it says on the tin – Miranda hands out her number to the masses of the public at the festival and we listen to the stories they leave on her voicemail...

Aunty Donna: Big Boys

This is Aunty Donna’s fourth Edinburgh Fringe, they have a huge following and return as popular as ever. The room is packed with fans – both Aussies and home-grown Scots – and after an hour of their hilarious, so stupid it’s kind of clever, rapping, dancing, big beats, improv and sketches I am officially converted too...

Break Up (We Need to Talk)

Review
★★★
Edinburgh Fringe
Summerhall
10th Aug, 2017

Five hours is a long time for everyone – it’s a long time for a viewer, it’s a long time for an actor, and it’s a long time to have an excruciating conversation about your relationship with your partner...

Kaitlyn Rogers: Can I Get an Amen?!

Can I get an Amen?! Is the subtitle of Aussie Comic Kaitlyn Rogers’ show and I do feel like yelling 'Amen' by the end of the show, because I’d been praying for it to be over.Rogers’ show is a whirlwind of funny, bad dancing, Aussie references, audience participation andher shouting ‘Amen,’ but she’s got a few, tired jokes and references that she keeps pulling back to and unfortunately, they’re just not funny...

Jason Byrne: The Man with Three Brains

Jason Byrne is no stranger to festival stand-up, or festival audiences, and he has returned once again to Scotland’s capital with his new tour, The Man with Three Brains (although, we never actually touch on the title during the performance)...

Buried: A New Musical

“A musical about two serial killers,” is how Buried: A New Musical by Colla Voce Theatre describes itself. That’s enough of a draw-in for me, but it doesn’t do the show justice at all...

That’s Life on Lisgar

That’s Life on Lisgar is a story of family fissures and the intimate workings of life as a daughter of a Portuguese family in Canada. Based on the small and quirky world of Lisgar Street in the Little Portugal area of Toronto, Kayla Subica takes you back to her childhood and her quest to reunite with her estranged grandma...

The Cambridge Footlights International Tour Show 2017: Dream Sequence

When an Edinburgh Fringe virgin asks a seasoned Fringe-lover (that’s me, by the way) for show recommendations there are a number of shows I always highlight before reviews have even started rolling in – the Cambridge Footlights tour is always one of them...

Spirit of the Dane

If Shakespeare’s greatest characters could talk, what would they say? Would they be happy about their storylines and demise, and how would they feel about all of the… “modern” interpretations of their character? Spirit of the Dane, an original and highly creative piece from Tony Cronin, shows us how Shakespeare greats Hamlet and Lady Macbeth might have answered these questions...

Brexit the Musical

How many times in the past year can you say that you felt genuinely sorry for Michael Gove? Or that you felt goose-bumps (the good kind!) when you heard Theresa May speak? Or perhaps you just REALLY wanted to see Boris Johnson do a show number? (Who doesn’t?) Well, luckily, Brexit the Musical will give you all those opportunities and more...

Dr Zeiffal, Dr Zeigal and the Hippo That Can Never Be Caught

You don’t need to be a hippo expert to help Dr Zieffal and Dr Ziegal catch a hippo in Edinburgh – all you need are the right tools and to keep your eyes peeled! The Hippo that Can Never be Caught teaches us all the different techniques you might need to spot your own hippo in the wilderness of Edinburgh as Dr Zieffal brings us along on her journey to catch one, showing us every step that needs to be taken to prepare for a sighting!Zieffal is a hippo-enthusiast, and by the end of the show, you will be too...

Princes of Main: New Year's Eve

A sketch show based on an end of 2017 new year’s eve party, Princes of Main: New Year’s Eve might miss the mark occasionally, but if you stick with it until the bells, it will ensure you’ll walk out full of new year cheer...

Faulty Towers The Dining Experience

“Manuel, please sit the guests down,” from the very first sentence, you know this is not going to be any ordinary evening meal – and I’m already clutching my glass of wine, fearful of it being spilt down my dress...

Dirty Dancing

A cheesy caricature of itself, Dirty Dancing is full of moments that will make you physically cringe but, if you’re after a literal movie-to-stage adaptation of the so-bad-it’s-good movie, then Dirty Dancing: The Story on Stage won’t disappoint the 1980s teenager inside you—and it would certainly deliver as the perfect “Girl’s Night Out”...

Stand by Me

Opening with the ever-familar chord progression of Stand by Me this tribute to Ben E King and the Drifters by Othello Music had the audience in the palm of their hand from the first number...

Dreamboats and Petticoats

Review
★★★
Edinburgh
Edinburgh Playhouse
10th May, 2017

Fans of rock and roll won’t be left disappointed by the musical numbers in teenage romance production, Dreamboats and Petticoats. The renditions of popular hits are performed with precision and musical skill and the live band is filled with true virtuosos...

Scottish Ballet Hansel & Gretel

Review
★★★★
UK Regional & Tours
Multiple Venues
18th Dec, 2016

Forget what you know about the traditional Brothers Grimm fairy tale; Christopher Hampson has taken this classic tale and injected it with magic and modern charm, his choreography capturing and telling the story of each individual character with perfection, while making excellent use of the original score by Engelbert Humperdinck—that’s the 19th century German composer, of course, not the 1960s balladeer! Some of the visuals were so mesmerising in the first half of the performance that the second half sometimes lacked this same magical quality...

One Musical to Rule Them All

An “Original Lord of the Rings Parody” One Musical to Rule them All is full of puns, mocks the bits of Lord of the Rings that we all thought were a bit ridiculous and illogical and is incredibly silly...

Mark Watson: I'm Not Here

Returning once again to the Pleasance stage, Mark Watson is not all there. He’s having a bit of an identity crisis... and you are invited to watch the hilarious breakdown.Mark Watson is one of those comedians that come across as nervous, fidgety on the stage, though oddly it puts you at immense ease in their show...

Into the Water

Into the Water promises to be a family-friendly show full of dancing and imagination. However, though the lighting and set were visually beautiful and despite the intricacy and obvious skill in the dancing, Into the Water is not a children’s show...

Stephen K Amos Talk Show

Sitting into a dark room, crammed with many other eagerly awaiting strangers, Stephen K Amos enters, his booming voice announcing his talk show and diving into some sarcasm-laced material about the Fringe – he has earned the right to poke fun at the Festival, performing here every year since 2003...

Carl Donnelly: Bad Man Tings

Carl Donnelly has reached peak age, he’s a vegan, he recently took up yoga, and he’s content with his life – I know it doesn’t sound like a good recipe for stand-up but somehow, it really, really is...

Australia: A Whinging Poms Guide

“All the Australians in the room put your hands up,” a splattering of us raise our hands, and little do we realise that Dan Willis will heavily rely on us to make up a good proportion of his show, and not in a good-audience-participation kind of way...

Neel Kolhatkar: Neel Before Me

If you are a millennial/Gen-Y/Gen-X-er you need to see Neel Kolhatkar. He’s an Aussie YouTube sensation with a huge social media following, and it’s clear to see why.When Kolhatkar first enters the room, his humour and jokes sort of ‘creep up’ on you – you’re lulled into a false sense of security with his casual chitchat manner, and before you realise it you’ve been hit with a line that makes you laugh but cover your eyes cringing at the same time...

Cabaret Whore Presents... La Poule Plombée

Bursting with musical variety and talent, razor-sharp lyrics and incredible chemistry, Sarah-Louise Young and Michael Roulston return to this year’s Fringe with Cabaret Whore Presents: La Poule Plombée...

A Pocketful of Grimms

Do you remember the warmth and magic you felt being told stories before bed as a kid? That elation you feel when you’re totally engrossed in a book? A Pocketful of Grimms brings that feeling into a well-executed, dynamic performance full of stories, puppetry, magic, singing and jokes that both children and adults will love and be captivated by...

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