Listings & Preview to Sun 9 Feb 2025

Feb 5 2025 | By | Reply More

What’s on Edinburgh’s stages this week?

There’s a pretty full card on this week, with all the big theatres up and running – and only the Traverse the Church Hill dark this week.

Top tip is the final chance to see Magnetic North’s incomparable We Will Hear the Angels at Fruitmarket (ends Thurs: tickets). Hard to describe, more than anything else: a brilliantly conceived meditation on the power of melancholy music. With Apphia Campbell worth the price of entry on her own.

Apphia Campbell We Will Hear The Angels. Pic Jassy Earl

Elsewhere there are two Shakespeare productions on offer from very different ends of the spectrum, both in terms of performance and of writing. Although both are set to the United States of America.

The students of the EUSC take on Much Ado About Nothing (Tue – Sat: tickets) at the Pleasance Theatre, transferring the action to Watergate-era America in the sun-drenched hills of Laurel Canyon. In what could be a most fascinating production, it is set in September 1973, with music, fame, and scandal all colliding in the uninhibited hedonism of the era.

At the Lyceum, American company Theatre for a New Audience continue with their immense, five star production of The Merchant of Venice (ends Sat 15 Feb: tickets). Set in a near-future North American city, this is a big immensely clever production.

While it explores the complex interplay of religion, race, colourism, classism, sexism, queerness, and more, with a dauntless commitment, it is also a hugely accessible production, which has caught the imagination of audiences of all ages.

light-hearted

Somewhat more light-hearted, but still a bona fide five star offering, Mary Poppins at the Festival Theatre (ends Sat 15 Feb: tickets) offers all the thrills of a Cameron Mackintosh and Disney spectacular. It’s a classic made even better by a whole bunch of excellent performances.

There is good availability for all performances of Much Ado and the Merchant. Less so for Mary Poppins with single tickets only at several weekend and matinee performances, although there are plenty of tickets for evening weekdays. If you are planning on a family outing during the Half Term break, best get those tickets now.

There is, however, practically no availability at all at the Playhouse this week, where Chicago (Tue – Sat: tickets) is all but sold out.

Full Listings

Click on the name of the show or the Book here link to go to its ticketing site.

Assembly Roxy
2 Roxburgh Place, EH8 9SU
Insane Magic (Insane Productions)
Sun 9 Feb 2025
One show: 7.30pm (Upstairs).
Witness some of the most incredible acts of magic from three U.K. magicians at the top of their game. Cameron Gibson, Tom Bolton, and Luke Osey are bringing everything from insane magic tricks and impossible illusions, to amazing acts of mind-reading. This is a show that’s “so insanely good” (WorldMagicReview.com) it has to be seen to be believed! Book here.

Festival Theatre
13/29 Nicolson Street EH8 9FT. Phone booking: 0131 529 6000.
Mary Poppins
Wed 22 Jan – Sat 15 Feb 2025
Tue – Sat: 7.30pm; Thurs, Sat mats: 2.30pm; Suns: 2pm.
Æ review: ★★★★★ Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious
Cameron Mackintosh and Disney’s spectacular production of the classic multi-award-winning musical arrives in Edinburgh with acclaimed Australian stars, Stefanie Jones and Jack Chambers reprising their roles as Mary Poppins and Bert. Book here.

Fruitmarket
45 Market Street, Edinburgh EH1 1DF
We Will Hear The Angels (Magnetic North)
Fri 24 Jan – Thurs 6 Feb 2025
Daily (not Sun/Mon): 7pm.
Æ report of 2022 Work-in-Progress is here.
Æ review: ★★★★☆ Intense
Taking its title from Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya, this explores the loneliness of heartbreak through four characters who find themselves telling their stories to the enigmatic Lou. What becomes of the broken-hearted? They find healing through the sublime power of music. Book here.

Leith Depot
138-142 Leith Walk EH6 5DT
Up in the Air (Penpal Productions)
Mon 3 Feb 2025

Evening: 8pm.
It’s time for another of the bi-monthly Drama@TheDepot evenings – six new short plays, rehearsed on the day and performed script-in-hand. This time the theme is “Up in the Air”. Details of plays, playwrights and performers are yet to be announced. But there will certainly be home baking! Book here.

Lyceum Theatre
Grindlay Street EH3 9AX. Phone booking: 0131 248 4848.
The Merchant of Venice
The Theatre for a New Audience production.
Sat 18 Jan – Sat 15 Feb 2025

Daily (not Sun/Mon): 7.30pm. Wed, Sat mat: 2.30pm.
Æ review: ★★★★★ Unflinching
Shakespeare’s perennially contested play about corrosive bigotry and blinding vengeance is poised at the radioactive intersection of race, class and religion in Arin Arbus’s production. Book here.

Playhouse
18 – 22 Greenside Place, EH1 3AA. Phone booking: 0844 871 3014.
Chicago
Tue 4 – Sat 8 Feb 2025
Evenings: 7.30pm; Matinee Thurs, Sat: 2.30pm.
See news story: Chicago razzles back.
Murder, greed, corruption, exploitation, adultery, treachery… and All That Jazz are back with the revival which opened in 1996 and has been running ever since. Book here.

Pleasance Theatre
60 Pleasance, EH8 9TJ.
Much Ado About Nothing (EUSC)
Tue 4 – Sat 8 February 2025
Evenings: 7pm.
Bold new retelling of Shakespeare, set against the backdrop of Watergate-era America in the sun-drenched hills of Laurel Canyon. It’s September 1973, and music, fame, and scandal all collide in the uninhibited hedonism of the 1970s. Book here.

*NB: This is intended to be a complete listing of all public theatrical productions on in Edinburgh. If you are staging a show which is not listed, or a listing is inaccurate, please get in touch through the contact page, here.

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