Susan Lowes
The Garden
★★★★☆ Insightful dystopia:
Truth permeates The Garden, Zinnie and John Harris’ semi-opera, commissioned by Aberdeen’s sound Festival and playing off-site at the Traverse.
Light Boxes
✭✭✭✭✩ Love and regret:
Light Boxes is fascinating. Grid Iron Theatre Company has woven a complex web, leaving the audience struggling to interpret what they are seeing.
Alba Flamenca
✭✭✭✭✭ Inviting and inspiring:
With so many shows on offer, it’s easy to forget a lot of what you see at the fringe. But you’ll never forget the way something makes you feel. Alba Flamenca is an emotive and fiery fiesta that inspires as much as it entertains.
The Last Kill
✭✭✭✭✩ Traumatic honesty:
A refreshing look at the human consequences of war is taken by newcomers, Contemporary Theatre of Scotland, who aren’t afraid to tell us what they really think.
Wojtek the Bear
✭✭✭✭✩ Love and regret
Theatre Objektiv brings alive a story of love and hope born from the abject trauma of war. While heart-warming, there’s also something unnerving in their telling of the tale.
Ada
✭✭✭✭✩ Educational and enchanting:
The student run Edinburgh University Theatre Company deliver an intriguing insight into the life of Ada Lovelace, but it might just be a little too clever for its own good.
The Rocking Horse Winner
✭✭✭✭✩ Unsettling:
At 30 minutes long, The Rocking Horse Winner from Bracket Productions might only be a bitesized fringe show, but it definitely has some teeth.
Austensibility
✭✭✭✩✩ Celebratory:
The Mercators are back at the Fringe this year with Austensibility; an engaging dramatised reading celebrating the life and works of Jane Austen.
Kevin McMahon – Quantum Magic
✭✭✭✩✩ Tricky:
Kevin McMahon entertains as a magician in his Quantum Magic at the Gilded Balloon, but ultimately there’s an sense of deception that doesn’t come from his tricks.
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
✭✭✭✭✩ Swift & dynamic:
An energetic and effervescent force runs through Gin and Tonic Productions take on one of Shakespeare’s most imaginative and delightful comedies.
