Horror show Hiatus
Edinburgh Horror Festival takes 2026 out
The volunteer committee running the Edinburgh Horror Festival (EHF) have announced that they are going to take a hiatus from staging the Festival in 2026, saying “after ten years, we need a break”.
Over the last ten years, the EHF has grown into a true fringe festival, taking over the vaults of the Banshee Labyrinth for a long week of experiment and alternative takes, with genres from theatre to magic and comedic events.
Its volunteer status makes it a much more affordable seeding ground for new plays than the Edinburgh Fringe, for example. And many of Edinburgh’s grassroots companies have been able to experiment at it.
Ash Pryce. Pic: Ash Pryce.
Æ spoke with EHF’s co-founder and current chair, Ash Pryce, in an attempt to find out a bit more about the situation. As he says, whether or not the EHF rises again, this tenth year hiatus feels like the end of an era.
News of the hiatus came in a social media post. The EHF committee said that as a small group of volunteers they might all love what they do, but after the 2025 festival they realised just how much harder things felt, how much toll the work was taking.
Pointing out that they are not the only ones making such a decision, they added: “Like so many people we are burnt out, or facing personal challenges, or health issues, and we need to take time to refocus and decide on our futures – both EHF and not. Put simply – we’re tired.”
The plan for the festival’s future is for the committee to reconvene at the end of 2026 and decide if they are able to stage a festival in 2027 – once everyone has had a chance to focus on their wellbeing.
monthly events will continue
Regarding EHF’s associated events, such as Saturday Fright Live, monthly events at Banshee Labyrinth will continue, as well as certain other special events which are run by the individual acts – with EHF providing box office support.
No decision has yet been made about The Spookies: Horror At The Fringe Awards, which is run by an even smaller team within the EHF committee, largely as a labour of love by the two women behind it.
The team emphasise that they are not shuttering the whole EHF project, just going into hiatus.
Dave Robb in The Devil in the Belfry, as EHF 2023 Pic: Chris Scott.
“This decision has been incredibly hard,” Pryce said. “Even if we hope to come back stronger, it does feel like an end of an era.
“Looking back over the last ten festivals I am incredibly proud of what we’ve accomplished, as a very small, entirely volunteer team, who do it because we genuinely love it.
“The outpouring of support we’ve received since we announced the hiatus has moved us to tears, and realising just how much kindness there is out there, when everything seems to be burning down, is humbling and encouraging.”
For those who know the Edinburgh Horror Festival, it is much more a few oogly goings on and some dressing up for halloween. It has attracted international shows which have arrived fully formed, and allowed local creatives to experiment.
highlight
“We’ve never been huge,” continues Pryce, “but for those we reach, the EHF has been a highlight in their calendar, and we have a lot of people – acts, volunteers, audiences – who return year after year. We’ve built a community, and I know many will feel our absence this year. We’ve made friends, colleagues, collaborators, I even met my wife through the EHF.
“We’ve also become a home for a large number of queer and neurodivergent creatives to experiment with new ideas in a safe, supportive environment. That’s something that happened organically, and I will always be grateful that we could be a platform for marginalised groups to have a voice.”
Daniel Orejon in The Rotting Hart, which premiered at EHF 2022 and went on to tour widely. Pic: Molly Wilders
The event might not have been “huge”, but there have always been plenty of performances. The 2025 iteration had a healthy 16 pieces of theatre amidst the even more healthy 41 different productions over the nine nights.
In terms of performances and productions, is a statistic which compares well with other smaller scale Edinburgh festivals. The difference is that other festivals have a core of paid staff – of course they are able to do much more in terms of outreach and so on, but there is still someone taking home a salary for doing what the EHF team do voluntarily.
So the question now, as the Edinburgh Horror Festival reaches this hard corner, is how it gets the new blood to ensure that it can make like the phoenix.
expanding the organisational team
“The main thing people can do right now to support us, and ensure the EHF can come back stronger, is to support the work that’s out there,” responds Pryce. “Keep horror theatre and live entertainment alive.
“On a more practical level, later in the year we will need to look at expanding our organisational team, as we simply cannot return if we don’t do that – we will just hit burn out again if we try.”
For EHF fans, then, it is a case of keeping your eyes on their socials and being ready to respond when the call comes. However Pryce is adamant that those who have already given their time and expertise should be recognised.
Rebecca Hale as Edith Nesbit in The Shadow in the Dark at EHF 2023. Pic: Thom Dibdin.
“I want to just take a moment to thank a few people,” he says. “Ana joined us in 2025 and was our volunteer coordinator, without them we simply wouldn’t have got through the weekend, so to Ana and the army of volunteers they brought to us I am forever grateful.
“But for the past few years it has been a small team – me, Tiana Connolly, Theresa Dewa, and Alex Staniforth. It is simply impossible for me to put into words how much their commitment, enthusiasm, support, kindness, and willingness to try new things has meant to me and the Edinburgh arts scene.
“They have made this journey easier to walk, and each of them is an incredible human being that simply wants to help, and support others, which is so rare it seems today.
“And to all of our acts, our audiences, Esje and the team at Banshee Labyrinth, and everyone who has helped make Edinburgh Horror Festival what it is, I thank you so very much, from the bottom of my heart and I hope to see you soon.”
EHF Links
Edinburgh Horror Festival Website: www.edhorrorfest.co.uk.
Facebook: @edhorrorfest.
Instagram: @edhorrorfest.
ENDS
