Newbury Youth Theatre artistic director ROBIN STRAPP reports home from Edinburgh Fringe. FOLLOWING their highly-successful run at Arlington Arts, Newbury Youth Theatre arrived safely in Edinburgh after a long coach journey to perform at the largest arts festival in the world. This is their 26th year of performing at the Fringe, quite an achievement.
Once again, they performed at Paradise in Augustines, a beautiful church that is converted to provide theatre spaces for the festival and is opposite the famous Greyfriars Bobby statue. With almost 4,000 shows across 300 venues with companies from 58 countries, there is plenty of competition. All genres are covered, with comedy the largest, and there is plenty to see spanning theatre, cabaret, music, dance, children’s shows, circus and musicals.
The themes this year include climate change, the female experience, neurodiversity, mental health, wellbeing and the NHS. Also there are 354 free shows and 577 pay-what-you-can as well as loads of street theatre all helping to create the party atmosphere that is the Fringe. With performances from international companies from Korea, Japan, Italy, France, the US and Australia this year promises to be magical.
The fun and excitement is being brave and finding a show outside your comfort zone that may just turn out to be a little gem. Newbury Youth Theatre enthusiastically worked the Royal Mile, selling their show and giving away fliers, engaging with people to entice the vast potential audience to come and see their production of The Fantastical World of My Uncle Arly. Based on the life and works of Edward Lear this family friendly rumbustious play sold well.
Every available space in the city is converted into a theatre and this year there is a cruise ship chartered by the American magazine Playbill moored in Leith, providing lavish accommodation and entertainment for 1,300 guests and by contrast you can see performances in a boxing ring and even a bath tub on Buccleuch Terrace. The company all stayed at Queen Margaret University in Musselburgh overlooking the beautiful Pentland Hills – a tranquil respite away from the chaotic bustle of the Fringe. This year it has been turned into a Festival Village with a host of activities for participants, including early-morning outdoor yoga which maybe a challenge for some.
The accommodation provided is in single study en-suite bedrooms, quite a luxury, with a large communal area and kitchen where they cooked all their food and lived together as a ‘professional’ theatre company. Edinburgh is only a six-minute train journey away with a station on the university campus, although this year with Scotrail’s overtime bans the carriages have been packed with hundreds of people trying to get into the city. Reviewer Rebecca Vines from Broadway Baby thought: “Newbury Youth Theatre brings the world of Lear to life with a wonderfully well-judged piece that eschews linear biography and leans into a zany, dreamlike atmosphere that would hardly disgrace one of his own works.
“Through physical theatre, verse, puppetry and live music, the cast energetically paddles through Lear's impecunious early life, illnesses, and complicated relationships. “It is a cleverly-devised and intriguing piece, which celebrates the nascent talent on display as surely as Lear’s own life. There are some superb uses of dramatic flourish; costuming and props are used with imaginative flair, and tricks and techniques are deployed sensitively.
“The wittiness and whimsicality of Lear’s original drawings and writings is evident from start to finish with delightful directorial touches woven throughout: the pobble’s toes being a particularly chucklesome example. “Some of the young performers are still honing their skills, whilst others are already strong and compelling performers; with some excellent and scene-stealing characterisations that scaffold and root the piece. “This is a nice little show which both entertains and educates in equal measure, bowling along with a charm and glee that reminds us all that beneath the flounce and fandangle of the Fringe, at its heart lies simply story after good story; absurdly, generously, and enthusiastically told.
” It’s an exciting week..
