Mark Fisher

Primary School Musical

17 Dec 2009

Fed up with the me-me-me narcissism of High School Musical? Hankering for the chutzpah of Bugsy Malone? Longing to see a song-and-dance show that has a built-in call to political action? Well, the opportunity is here with Primary School Musical, a…

Richard Dawkins - The Greatest Show on Earth

3 Sep 2009

Right, pay attention at the back. You boy, straighten your tie. Now, you all know why you’ve been called back for detention with Professor Dawkins and, frankly, you’ve only got yourselves to blame. He explained it all very carefully in The Selfish Gene…

The Silver Darlings

3 Sep 2009

There’s something cinematic about Kenny Ireland’s staging of the Neil M Gunn novel, adapted here by Peter Arnott. It’s in the sepia photographs of crofts, brochs and cliffs that form a backdrop to Hayden Griffin’s open set of layered coastal rock. It’s…

If That’s All There Is

Cynical piece of work

24 Aug 2009

Less a play than a series of sketches, this show created by Inspector Sands is about a couple of maladjusted professionals approaching their wedding day. Wittily staged, it has some good gags about the bureaucratic mindset, but it is ultimately a…

The Doubtful Guest

The Gorey details

20 Aug 2009

That Hoipolloi’s staging of the Edward Gorey fable is entertainingly done is without question. It is not only an adaptation of this story about a pointy-faced creature in white canvas shoes who takes residence in a grand country mansion, but also an…

East 10th Street: Self Portrait with Empty House

Three storeys of NYC stories

13 Aug 2009

Edgar Oliver will not be the only actor taking on the Everyman persona this August. Like innumerable stand-up comics and solo performers, he presents himself as the still centre of a chaotic world. By identifying with him, we can share his strange…

Funny

An inability to see the potential in a great idea

12 Aug 2009

There’s a great idea behind Tim Nunn’s new play for Glasgow’s Reeling & Writhing about the army’s use of humour to interrogate suspects. Instead of tackling the clash of comedy and combat head on, however, the playwright gets distracted by his…

The Hotel

The suite smell of success

10 Aug 2009

If Punchdrunk, the fashionable London site-specific theatre company, gave the job of artistic director to Arthur Smith, the comedic genius behind the Fringe’s Arturart exhibitions, the results would look a lot like The Hotel. Throw in a touch of Fawlty…

Beachy Head

Suicide brings on many changes

10 Aug 2009

Like its predecessor, Mile End , Analogue’s Beachy Head is as much about the way the story is told as it is about the story itself. No scene goes by without a screen being wheeled on, a video camera being focused or an actor tottering in front of a…

Sea Wall

Pray silence for an exquisite performance

8 Aug 2009

Alex does not voice the cruellest words he ever spoke. We don’t actually hear the dreadful phrase he utters to his father-in-law. But we can imagine it. Playwright Simon Stephens is too subtle a craftsman to allow his central character to blurt it out…

Bourne to be wild - Mark Ravenhill interview

New show based on flamboyant gay theatre icon Bette Bourne

6 Aug 2009

Mark Ravenhill is making a habit of redefining what a Fringe play can be. Two years ago, his Ravenhill for Breakfast offered ever growing crowds a chance to see a daily changing programme of short plays written almost as fast as they could be performed…

Rock ‘n’ droll star: Jon Holmes

Mark Fisher meets the radio presenter and comic satirist

6 Aug 2009

You can’t get the pop stars these days. In the glorious 1970s, it was every musician’s duty to live a life of hedonistic excess, but then we hit a sidetrack on the otherwise straight and narrow road to Pete Doherty and Amy Winehouse, and our…

Man for all seasons - Phil Nichol at the Fringe

Mark Fisher finds Phil Nichol mining two rich seams of comedy at this year’s Fringe

23 Jul 2009

One is a Restoration farce typically performed by seasoned rep actors on grand proscenium-arch stages. The other is a scabrous heist comedy in which a middle-management executive is kidnapped in a Fife factory.

Naked ambition - Nic Green's 'Trilogy'

Mark Fisher meets the theatre-maker who’s still proud to call herself a feminist

23 Jul 2009

Nic Green was leading a discussion recently when a young man questioned her use of the word ‘feminism’. ‘No one wants to hear that word, can’t you call it womanism?’ he asked.

Ready for take off

He may have branched out in recent times, but Alistair McGowan is returning to his first love.

22 Jul 2009

There can’t be many people for whom the Wimbledon panto is a life-changing event. Not even the gaggle of Gareth Gates fans waiting outside the stage door for an autograph from their very own Prince Charming would go that far. But for Alistair McGowan…

Mercy Madonna of Malawi

Adopting a view of the Material Girl

21 Jul 2009

It’s reasonable to assume Robert Magasa never expected to land his latest stage role. He is tall, male and black and speaks with a distinct Malawian accent, characteristics that should disqualify him from playing Madonna, a pop star famous for being…

The World's Wife

Visceral poetry from the new laureate

20 Jul 2009

You can't fault Linda Marlowe for timing. No sooner had the original Oh! Calcutta star and Berkoff protégé decided to adapt Carol Ann Duffy's The World's Wife for the stage, than the Glasgow-born Duffy landed the job of poet laureate. An hour or so…

Fest foot forward

Whatever your taste, Edinburgh has an August event to match

13 Jul 2009

Nowhere does a festival quite like Edinburgh. Spend a year in the city and you can clock up more than a dozen, from horror film weekend Dead by Dawn to the internationally renowned winter Hogmanay event. And that’s before you take daytrips to catch the…

Anna Reynolds - Stand by Your Van

Drama about a Texas car dealership's hands-on competition

13 Jul 2009

Stand by Your Van explores the game show where contestants hold onto a vehicle for up to 100 hours. Mark Fisher gets bleary-eyed at the prospect

Brian Friel retrospective includes Faith Healer, The Yalta Game and Afterplay

Three plays by the Irish Chekov

13 Jul 2009

At the head of the pantheon of Irish dramatists there is JM Synge, there is Sean O’Casey and there is Brian Friel. As far as director Patrick Mason sees it, there is no question: Friel is Ireland’s greatest living writer. ‘It’s an amazing opus,’ he…

Daniel Kitson - The Interminable Suicide of Gregory Church

A comic known for his bitter-sweet monologues prepares to die

13 Jul 2009

The Fringe has a template for restless comedians with an urge to do serious drama. Find a popular play, call your stand-up pals and throw the show on with a no-frills budget. This year, Bruce Morton and Phil Nichol are doing just that with a revival of…

Diaspora with TheatreWorks and the Singapore Chinese Orchestra

Ong Keng Sen's multimedia ode to migration

13 Jul 2009

Anyone living in Scotland understands what is meant by diaspora. The story of the Highland Clearances and the waves of emigration that followed is an accepted part of the nation’s identity. Indeed, the assumption behind the Scottish Government’s current…

Giorgio Battistelli's Experimentum Mundi and Fair is Foul, Foul is Fair

Revolutionary sonic collaboration between composers and craftsmen

13 Jul 2009

Giorgio Battistelli is demonstrating the rhythm of a conventional piece of classical music. ‘Peak-peak-peak-peak,’ he counts out. By contrast, he says, the beat of a shoemaker’s hammer is altogether less regular: ‘Tic-tic-tack, tic-tic.’ That was the…

Talking life and death at Beachy Head

A new drama by Fringe First-winning company Analogue

13 Jul 2009

I’m not saying Liam Jarvis is morbid, but after the co-director’s 2007 Fringe First-winning hit Mile End – the true story of a man pushed in front of a London underground train – he is back with Beachy Head , best known as East Sussex’s most picturesque…

Balgay Hill - Simon Macallum

28 May 2009

Today we associate Dundee with the enterprising work of Dundee Rep’s ensemble, the world-class art at DCA and the tourist attractions of the City of Discovery. It’s a place the Victoria and Albert Museum can consider setting up a northerly outpost…