Key events

Are there too many privately educated performers at the fringe?

Leeabroad asks: Should the fringe consider imposing a limit on the number of privately educated performers or class socio-economic based diversity quotas to stop its headlong descent to becoming even more of a posho fest than it already is?

Brian:

double quotation markI bow to no one in my distaste for private education and the poshification of things. But I really don’t recognise the description of the fringe as a posho fest. Of course there’s lots of work to do to ensure that a wider range of people can attend and present work at the fringe.

But there is already great diversity onstage (and in the audience). I would love there to be more, and lots of fantastic people work hard year-on-year to ensure that people without massive disposable incomes can take part. But I defy anyone to spend a day or two at the fringe, watching a more or less random cross-section of work, and come away thinking that they’ve only seen posh people at play. It just isn’t true.

Frank Skinner, whose Work in Progress takes place at the Avalon, is outspoken about experiencing classism due to his working class roots. Photograph: Antonio Olmos/The ObserverShould the Edinburgh festivals be spread across several cities?

TobermorayNightlife asks: One of the main things that drives up costs for both performers and audiences is the fact that Edinburgh simultaneously hosts the Festival, the traditional fringe and the comedy festival that has been bolted onto the Fringe, the Book Festival and the TV festival. All that means there’s too few venues and too little accommodation. Would it not be sensible for the comedy industry to relocate its annual trade fair to somewhere like Manchester or Bristol instead?

Brian:

double quotation markIt might be sensible. But who wants their comedy to be sensible? I fully acknowledge the huge problems around access and the costs attached to visiting Edinburgh at festival time, as a performer or as an audience member. But I also think that what makes the festival special, in part, is that all these different artforms and experiences are piled atop of one another, and striking sparks off one another.

I *love* the book festival, and my experience as a comedy reviewer at the fringe is immeasurably improved by being able to visit it too. And to consider comedy not from within a comedy bubble but as something taking place within a wider arts, and societal, ecology.

(Not to deny that the fringe/festival is a bubble, of course. It is.)

The many art forms at the simulaneous festivals make Edinburgh special as they strike ‘sparks off one another.’ Photograph: Jane Barlow/PAAfter years of reviewing comedy, do you still get belly laughs?

Castconcrete asks: Most punchlines are funny because they come unexpected, but after years of reviewing comedy, does any act even surprise you anymore? I don’t enjoy comedy as much as I used to because even I know what’s coming (perhaps those mixed with a bit of magician act or improv still have that element of surprise). But how does it work after doing this for a living? Do you still get that state of “wow” and genuine belly laughs?

Brian:

double quotation markThere’s no point pretending that, after years of comedy-watching, some of the base-level mechanics of comedy have lost their power to surprise. But the best comedians don’t resort to the base levels. Or if they do, they so adeptly reinvent or conceal or re-engineer them that there’s a surprise and delight to seeing that process in action. (See for recent fringe examples Elouise Eftos’s show about sexiness last summer, or anything by recent Comedy Award champ Jordan Brookes.)

The comedy I get most excited by is the stuff that makes me laugh or gasp *and not know why*. I love the sensation of puzzling out why I’ve just found something so startling or funny or unexpected; I love to get to write about it. And there are always, and always will be, new acts and new shows that deliver that pleasure. So yes, I still get not-infrequent ‘wow’s and a huge sense of pleasure and privilege to be seeing and writing about comedy.

Most people who come to comedy shows with me, though, will tell you that belly laughs are (alas!) only very infrequently my thing.

Jordan Brookes: The Part of You That’s Always Screaming is one of the most anticipated comedy shows this year. Photograph: Murdo MacLeod/The GuardianDoes being a reviewer influence a show if you’re seen?

masepod asks: As a well-known comedy critic, do you feel a vibe change when the comic notices you in the room?

Brian:

double quotation markMercifully, this seldom happens. Sometimes a comedian will make a big public deal out of singling out the critic in the room, and get laughs by doing so. To be on the receiving end of that is – well, it’s not my happy place.

But I suspect most comedians neither know nor care who I am, far less want to acknowledge my entry into a room. Quite rightly, their focus is on the people in the audience who’re there for more innocent reasons.

Does stand-up’s format make it a bit boring?

Captainsnort asks: Do you agree that, in Edinburgh and elsewhere, the almost complete reliance on a single format - the hour-long show that’s supposedly about something, but is usually just a string of loosely related “bits”, perhaps with some added crowd work and a bit of padding for a lucrative regional theatre tour - has made stand-up a bit boring?

Brian:

double quotation markGood question. I think it could equally be argued that the fringe in this country (and beyond) has made comedy more interesting, liberating it from the simplifying strictures of club comedy, encouraging it to take more creative / theatrical risks. You’d never have comedy shows like, say, Joseph Morpurgo’s Soothing Sounds for Babies or Tim Key’s 2011 show-in-a-bath Masterslut, without the fringe.

But yes, I acknowledge that the straitjacket of the 55-minute running time, and certain discernible formulae in the creation of shows to fit it, can make things sometimes feel samey. The show you describe though, while not uncommon, isn’t representative of the best work on the fringe.

There are ‘meh’ examples of every type of art/entertainment. But a good creative comedian won’t make a show that’s as transparent or cynical as you describe, and the best shows really will be ‘about something’, rather than just pretending to be.

Tim Key performing ‘Mulberry’. ‘The best shows really will be “about something”, rather than just pretending to be. Photograph: Antonio Olmos/The ObserverHow do you decide which shows to review?

Ithacanow asks: Hi Brian. Love your reviews but I wanted to know, when you decide to review a show at the Edinburgh fringe, what criteria do you use? And have you ever gone to a show based merely on its striking poster? Are posters at the Fringe pointless?

Brian:

double quotation markIt is an inexact science. I wish I could say there was some scrupulously fair methodology. There isn’t. I try not to be steered too much by paid PR. I have conversations, I read other reviews. I try to see as many new (to me) acts as I can, and to go off-piste when I can – while balancing that with readers’ desire to read about (and my desire to write about) newsworthy acts, bigger names and shows that are acknowledged to be making a splash.

I’ll revisit my schedule and my already-published reviews regularly to make sure I’m getting a broad cross-section of work – whether that’s by genre, demographics of artist, venue, whatever. But then, at the end of the festival, I always leaving regretting the possibly amazing shows I didn’t get around to seeing. There isn’t enough time to see even a fraction of them.

I’ve definitely had my attention caught by a grabby poster (Who can forget Tim Vine’s cheeky 2006 offering “Tim Vine is not appearing at this year’s Edinburgh festival …”), and that may (who knows?) tip the scales or add sufficiently to the critical mass of influences that encourage me to go see that show. I wouldn’t say posters are pointless; they very likely influence audiences, whether or not that includes critics.

‘I’ve definitely had my attention caught by a grabby poster, and that may tip the scales.’ Photograph: Stephen Barnes/Entertainment/AlamyAt what age is a child old enough to go to the fringe?

ChrisofKent asks: Spending a long weekend at the fringe used to be one of the highlights of my year, but since becoming a parent I haven’t visited. I know it won’t be quite the same, but at what age would you recommend bringing a child? I know there are a lot of great kids shows.

Brian:

double quotation markPlease take your kids! I take mine every year. Especially before the Scottish schools go back, there are loads and loads of shows for kids to enjoy. And even if you don’t go to a single one, the streets teem with the kind of life that blows a child’s mind. All of my kids visited since they were babies: there are plenty shows even for babes-in-arms.

One of the great pleasures is the opening-up year-on-year of the kinds of shows I can take them to see. I just think the fringe is a fantastic environment for children, a world-turned-upside-down where, for three weeks only, creativity, carnival and colour are more important than – well, all the usual not-as-exciting stuff.

Family entertainment includes Kenyan acrobats The Black Blues Brothers who perform to a rock’n’roll soundtrack. Photograph: Lesley Martin/PAShouldn’t it all just move to London?

BDurutti1936 asks: Wouldn’t it be easier to have the festival in London, it would save all the reviewers, TV companies etc from having to make the tedious journey north for a couple of weeks every year?

Brian:

double quotation markThe journey north to Scotland is not tedious, it is THE MOST JOYFUL JOURNEY A HUMAN BEING CAN MAKE.

The Palace of Varieties, in That London. Photograph: Dennis van de Graaf/Getty ImagesIs the Edinburgh fringe really ‘Edinburgh’?

Sausolito asks: Is there any ‘Edinburgh’ in the ‘Edinburgh festivals’, apart from the good old Tattoo of course?

Brian:

double quotation markYes, there is but probably not as much as there ought to be. The Traverse Theatre remains one of the go-to destinations on the fringe, and the work they stage has a local bias. (Even if one of this year’s Trav stars, Elaine C Smith, is very much more Glasgow than Edinburgh). The Stand Comedy Club showcases a lot of Scottish standup talent. And the Made in Scotland showcase gives a decent profile to a lot of wider Scottish performance.

All of that said, a lot of Scottish acts don’t feel very welcome or celebrated at their own festival. I watch a lot of comedy acts on the fringe who seem to assume their audience is generic English/British rather than Scottish, which I find graceless. I wish more audiences saw their visit to the fringe as an opportunity to engage with the indigenous culture, which is there if you look for it.

Scottish actor Elaine C Smith, who will be starring in Cathy at The Traverse Theatre during the fringe, recieves the Freedom of the City of Glasgow. Photograph: Jane Barlow/PAWhat shows will make twentysomethings love the festival?

Catski asks: My two kids (early 20s) don’t know anything about the festival. What fun/amazing/striking shows for the 22 and 23 August should I book to hook them on returning for life?

Brian:

double quotation markI am an evangelist for the Edinburgh festival, and would love to have the killer answer to this question that binds your kids to the fringe for all time. But part of the fun of approaching the fringe is that (notwithstanding all those prefestival ‘shows not to miss’ articles…) none of us really know what the must-see shows are going to be by late August.

I’d say take your kids, throw yourself into all the street performance, the free shows in every nook and cranny, the overwhelming sights and sounds of this beautiful city at festival-time, go see a cross-section of comedy/theatre/dance/music performance (selected partly at random, partly at the suggestion of infallible experts like myself). Then point those twentysomethings towards any of the city’s never-sleeping night spots and let the fabled ‘spirit of the fringe’ do the rest.

‘Throw yourself into all the street performance, the free shows in every nook and cranny, the overwhelming sights and sounds.’ Photograph: Murdo Macleod/The Guardian