13 New Shows Join Underbelly's Fringe Line-up

Today Underbelly announces 13 new shows joining its Fringe herd. Pushing the limits of imagination, human skill and laughs per minute, this brilliant line-up will see everyone amoosed and astounded!

After the huge success of last year's Untapped season, Underbelly and New Diorama Theatre are proud to present this year's winners of the Untapped Award which supports three young theatre companies to bring their work to the Fringe.

Award-winning, politically-engaged company Barrel Organ presents larger-than-life theatre show, Conspiracy, which takes a closer look at conspiracy theories and fake news. Female-led Burnt Lemon Theatre turns the dial back to 1949 in Tokyo Rose to highlight the story of a wartime American radio presenter Iva Ikuko Toguri D'Aquino tried for treason in the U.S. The third Untapped Award winner, Poltergeist, takes its audiences to Art Heist, an existential comedy caper which asks the Big Questions. What is art? Why is it Extremely Valuable? And, how much can I get for this on eBay?

Also in this year's theatre programme, direct from a sold-out, award-winning run in New York is America is Hard to See. Using verbatim interviews, Methodist hymns and original songs, this daring new play investigates the Miracle Village, a rural American community for sex offenders buried deep in Florida's sugarcane fields.

In the wild and wonderful land of Underbelly's Circus Hub comes the global phenomenon that is Super Sunday by Finnish ensemble Race Horse Company. Bringing your wildest dreams to the stage, Super Sunday is a colourful, vivid and humorous rollercoaster ride with a bonehead approach and endless black humour, featuring a death wheel, two human catapults and a Russian bar.

Multi award-winning YUCK Circus makes its European premiere at Underbelly's Circus Hub in August. YUCK Circus isn't lightly throwing around women's issues - it's literally throwing women. Authentic storytelling, powerful physicality and raw Australian humour is set to have audiences on the edge of their seats, using high-flying acrobatics, absurd confessions and groovy dancing. Not to be missed!

In the comedy programme, star of Live at the Apollo, Mock of the Week, and Have I Got News for You, known for his eagle-eyed current affairs comedy, Andrew Maxwell presents All Talk, a memorable cocktail of personal stories, astute political observations and the odd surprise foray into character cameos. Ireland's star of BBC's Blame Game and fluffer for Netflix show Flinch, Micky Bartlett divulges more hilarious secrets that most people wouldn't tell their priest in a new show, Love It!

Gareth Waugh returns to Edinburgh following two sold-out festivals runs, touring with Katherine Ryan and Daniel Sloss also debuting his solo show in New York. In Just Me...?! Gareth decides to share his innermost embarrassing stories after suffering another excruciating, yet hilarious, revelation about his weird behaviours and ticks. Lucy Frederick also makes a welcome come back to the Festival with Famtastic, a brand-new hour of stand-up comedy about becoming part of a modern blended family, avoiding its wicked pitfalls and navigating the alarming world of parenting.

Eddie Izzard once said "If I was an Italian comedian performing in English, I would want to be as funny as Francesco De Carlo". Francesco joins us to take his audiences on a journey through his Italian family, literature, architecture and other words he cannot pronounce properly in Winning Hearts and Minds.

The three-year sell-out CSI: Crime Scene Improvisation returns with a brand-new whodunnit show to solve a murder invented by the audience. Every show is different! Someone's kicked the bucket. But who, what and how? The choice is yours, the problem is theirs.

For Underbelly's younger spectators, Louis Pearl aka The Amazing Bubble Man aka Edinburgh Fringe Favourite presents another hour of breath-taking bubbles, comedy and tricks which have been thrilling audiences around the world for over three decades. From square bubbles to rocket bubbles, The Amazing Bubble Man conjures shrieks of laughter and gasps of amazement from all ages!

These 13 new shows join the udderly amazing line-up of Irish viral sensations Foil, Arms and Hog, the legendary Whose Line Is It Anyway? Live on Fringe featuring Clive Anderson and Marcus Brigstocke and five-star Fringe favourites Circa with Humans among others announced and to come. For the full line-up to date visit www.underbellyedinburgh.co.uk.

Charlie Wood and Ed Bartlam, directors of Underbelly said; "This year's Untapped award-winning shows are both artistically exciting and unique in their offering, we're looking forward to supporting their journey to Edinburgh and success at this year's Fringe!

"Both Race Horse Company and YUCK Circus are distinctive, fresh, nail-biting, international leaders in circus and we are thrilled that they join the Circus Hub programme this year as our Meadows' venue goes from strength to strength. And of course we're delighted to welcome Lucy Frederick, Micky Bartlett, Gareth Waugh, Francesco De Carlo and Andrew Maxwell to what's shaping up to be a very strong year for comedy at Underbelly this summer."

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