Reviews & features: Theatre, Niki Boyle
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Dracula: Sex, Sucking and Stardom
17 Aug 2012
A thoroughly camp vamp
Jonathan Harker leaves his fiancée Mina to go to Transylvania, where he has some business to transact with the mysterious Count Dracula. When he gets there, he finds a jazz-handsy vamp obsessed with travelling to England and auditioning for Andrew Lloyd…
Fringe 2012 Bribe of the Week: Thread
7 Aug 2012
Runners up include Call Me! and Dracula: Sex, Sucking and Stardom
Our Bribe of the Week won its title through a combination of nostalgia, team-building and being the only bribe that came before our print deadline. Thread is a site-specific performance set in a church hall in the midst of a beetle drive, so it makes…
Serve Cold
5 Aug 2012
A nasty dramatic thriller with a patchy script
Joy (Elaine McKergow) stands on a bridge, contemplating the river below and swigging a bottle of red wine. Grace (Nicola Clark) is an on-duty prostitute, who walks by to make sure Joy isn’t thinking of jumping in. After paying for Grace’s services for…
Nothing is Really Difficult
4 Aug 2012
None-more-Fringe physical theatre performance
Inside a purpose-built plywood cube on George Square, three grown men run around, striking poses and indulging in slapstick behaviour, with the odd flash of profundity and occasionally sinister undertones. None of them utters a word, and at one point…
Interview: Miriam Margolyes, star of Dickens' Women
1 Aug 2012
The veteran actor of stage and screen discusses Dame Eileen Atkins, salmon and Graham Norton
First record you ever bought. Last extravagant purchase you made. First film you saw that really moved you. Last lie you told. First movie you ever went on a date to. Last time you cried. First thing you do when you’ve got time off work.
Attention Fringe 2012 performers: we want your bribes
9 Jul 2012
Buy yourself valuable exposure by sending us your promotional tat
The List is once again declaring itself susceptible to bribery for the duration of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe 2012. Effective immediately, we will be accepting whatever t-shirts toy tractors, confections, underpants, self-portraits, office…
The List supports artists' right to swear at the Fringe
31 May 2012
Show titles remain uncensored in our comprehensive Fringe listings
There has been some controversy at the Fringe this year about the programme's decision to censor the swearier aspects of certain acts' shows. Liam Mullone, Richard Herring and Stuart Goldsmith have raised the issue in various interviews and statements…
First raft of shows from 2012 Edinburgh Fringe programme
5 Mar 2012
Stewart Lee, Jimmy Carr, Rhod Gilbert and more to appear at Fringe 2012
The Edinburgh Festival Fringe has revealed around 60 shows to take place at this year's event in August. The announcement comes weeks before the full line-up announcement on Thu 31 May. Comedy shows form the bulk of the latest show announcements…
Fringe 2011 awards roundup
30 Aug 2011
Multi-award winners include Mission Drift, Leo, Simon Callow and Silent
As the dust settles from this year’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe, we see which figures are poised to stand tall on the cultural landscape with a clutch of awards under their belts The Scotsman Fringe First Awards One for productions appearing at the…
Little Matter
23 Aug 2011
Charming, dark puppetry
In their delightful purpose-built gypsy caravan/tent venue the River People weave a story of hope and despair using puppetry and song. The performers overflow with wit and charm, interacting with each other and the puppets comfortably. While the…
When Abel Met Cain
23 Aug 2011
Middle Eastern music distracted by incoherant stories
Raphael Rodan and Anastasis Sarakatsanos are talented musicians – between them they create a Middle-Eastern atmosphere using guitar, percussion and kanun (a Turkish stringed instrument). Rodan is also highly charismatic, telling tales of brotherhood and…
The Adventures of Alvin Sputnik
19 Aug 2011
Poignantly Pixar-esque underwater adventure
Alvin Sputnik’s poster comparison to Wall-E is an apt one, although other Pixar parallels would fit equally well. As in Finding Nemo, this underwater world is vast and filled with danger. As in Up, there are moments of heartbreaking grief. And like…
Reservoir Dogs
17 Aug 2011
Unimaginative adaptation of Tarantino’s heist movie
Quentin Tarantino has his fair share of detractors – those who claim his films make up for their lack of originality with profanity and violence. These people should swipe an extra star or two from this review, since Tarantino’s plot and dialogue are…
Bane 1, 2 and 3
16 Aug 2011
Superior noir-influenced multi-character comedy
Bane is the hard-boiled, noir-edged creation of Joe Bone. Together with musician Ben Roe, he creates a universe every night where creeps roam the streets, bad guys talk in suspicious accents and the right kind of anti-hero is always willing to shoot…
Haroun and the Sea of Stories
16 Aug 2011
Enthusiastic but amateurish adaptation of Rushdie’s novel
Top marks for the ambition displayed by the Mid-Pacific Institute School of the Arts in choosing to adapt Salman Rushdie’s allegorical bedtime story. Written while the author’s life was under threat in the wake of the publication of The Satanic Verses…
Scottish Sperm
16 Aug 2011
Smartly scripted and well performed despite lack of character sympathy
Smartly scripted and well performed, Scottish Sperm concerns three young Americans and their interweaving relationships. The lightning-fast deadpan delivery keeps things progressing at a steady clip, but the play’s strength is also its major failing…
Tales from Edgar Allan Poe
16 Aug 2011
Ghost stories told with vigour and energy
Those familiar with Poe’s ‘The Raven’ may be amused at Backhand Theatre’s proud boast that Sir Derek Jacobi voices the titular bird, who speaks only two words (albeit repeatedly). ‘The Raven’, ‘The Fall of the House of Usher’ and ‘The Tell-Tale Heart…
James Galea: I Hate Rabbits
12 Aug 2011
High on production values, low on magic
Before the titular magician arrives on stage, there are a few mockumentary video clips of traditional rabbit-loving magicians explaining how much they hate James Galea for insulting their profession. This is followed by a showreel of his greatest…
Belleville Rendez-vous
11 Aug 2011
Inventive adaptation of Gallic animated classic
The main difference between FellSwoop’s adaptation of Belleville Rendez-vous and Sylvain Chomet’s animated original is the setting: while Chomet jumped right into the life of a pint-sized grandmother and her recently-orphaned bicycle-loving grandson…
Mark Twain Abroad
11 Aug 2011
Dramatic recreation of a lecture by the famous author lacks panache
Purportedly embarking on a round-the-world lecturing tour in order to pay off his ‘considerable debts’, Mark Twain (Todd Wronski) discards the original speech he had prepared in favour of an hour-long discourse on the benefits of travelling. In it, he…
Lord of the Flies
10 Aug 2011
William Golding’s classic novel slightly adjusted for modern times
The words ‘contemporary adaptation’ can send shivers down a reviewer’s spine, especially when the source material is one of the 20th century’s finest literary works. Thankfully, Big Spirit Youth Theatre’s reworking of William Golding’s 1954 novel…
Alice in Wonderland and Other Adventures With Lewis Carroll
8 Aug 2011
Badly sung songs, ill-fitting costumes and stilted delivery
Actor Richard Smithies looks ‘surprisingly like’ Lewis Carroll says the Fringe catalogue – unfortunately, this is where the positives end. The songs are badly sung to midi backing tracks, the costume ill-fitting, the delivery stilted and crucial…
The Magical Faraway Tree
8 Aug 2011
Multi-character comedy not really based on Enid Blyton tale
If you’re looking for a family-friendly rendering of an Enid Blyton tale, beware – this isn’t it. Instead, the supremely silly boys of Sleeping Trees Theatre have concocted a multi-character comedy with only the slenderest of roots lodged in Blytonian…
Belt Up’s The Boy James
8 Aug 2011
Well-executed drama based on JM Barrie's childhood
The Boy James, loosely based on the childhood of JM Barrie, begins with childish enthusiasm but gradually moves into more sinister ground, and ends with no firm resolution. Although the acting and script occasionally falter, the overall effect is one of…
Remembering Annabel
8 Aug 2011
Edgar Allan Poe adaptation feels messy despite flashes of humour
Riding high on the critical success of their 2010 show Pale Moon, the young members of Cathartic Connections chose to adapt Edgar Allan Poe’s Annabel Lee as their follow-up. While there are clever flashes of humour, much of the plotting feels messy and…
