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The Truman Capote Talk Show – Winner: Scotsman Fringe First Award

 
A. A. Lewis Review by A. A. Lewis 4 Published: 3 Aug 2025 Pleasance Courtyard Show Dates: 30 Jul 2025-25 Aug 2025

The Truman Capote Talk Show is a poignant and informative exposé on the life and death of a great writer. Winner of the Scotsman Fringe First 2024, this one-man play starring Bob Kingdom about the iconic American writer returns to the Edinburgh Fringe at the intimate Attic at Pleasance Courtyard. Capote remains an icon of culture, both popular and amongst our literati, and any staging of his life and times, or rather his death and times, consequently comes with preconceptions. These may be about the actor’s mimicry of his unique speaking voice, or the specificity of his gestures, his posture, and so on.

A poetic piece of writing, lyrically enfleshed by a terrific central performance

Within the first few minutes of this play, these preconceptions vanish. Kingdom makes his interpretation known: more than an impression, Kingdom’s Capote is his own invention, not unlike noteworthy portrayals of distinct historical personalities like Gary Oldman’s Churchill or Frank Langella’s Nixon – arguably even a conduit for the ideas this monologue aims to convey.

The stage is minimal: it is Capote, costumed in the author’s recognisable vogue, a small wooden table which could as easily display a typewriter or a cocktail glass as it does Capote’s symbolic hat, which sits there for the show’s duration, and us. The stage is set – as Capote himself describes it, self-consciously referencing the mechanisms of the theatre itself – and, arguably, one of the most performative authors of the 20th century is granted an audience post-mortem to directly address with the details of his life: his successes, his solitude, his addictions, his losses (from death or betrayal in the name of art). If you don’t know anything about Capote going into this play, then it is guaranteed to teach you a thing or two, not only about the author but about the celebrity cultures – particularly classical Hollywood – and metropolitan circles he fervently pursued. Jokes are consistent, often ironic, always observational and Capote-ish in phrasing (“She had one of her faces lifted…”) – some of which will certainly go over the heads of audience members who haven’t heard of Greta Garbo, among other large-scale names of yesteryear.

But The Truman Capote Talk Show also connects on an emotional level which, in the end, cuts through its wall of irony and deadpan references to the formal features of theatre within the play itself. By the end, what we are left with is precisely what the world is left with – an image of Truman Capote, haunted by unfulfilment in the final phase of his life: a portrait of the author which subverts the standard tale put to stage or screen in the past.

This is a poetic piece of writing, lyrically enfleshed by a terrific central performance, which asks questions about honesty, love, integrity, and happiness. For those who didn’t catch it last summer, now is the time.

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The Blurb:

Glitzy, bitchy, chic, unique... heartbreaking. Bob Kingdom reprises his critically-acclaimed and iconic performance in this multi-award-winning production as the brilliant, adorable and infamous writer of In Cold Blood and Breakfast at Tiffany's. Scotsman Fringe First Award winner and New York Times Critic's Pick. 'Terrific script, tight, funny, poignant and bursting with celebrated one-liners. Go straight to this show' ***** (Guardian). 'A tour de force' (New York Times). 'An acerbic account of the reality of celebrity... Kingdom's performance is captivating' **** (WhatsOnStage.com).