Scotland Theater Reviews Page 23

EDINBURGH 2023: Review: OLLIE HORN: NOT MUCH, Just The Tonic at The Mash House
by Kat Mokrynski - August 07, 2023

What’s the worst gig you’ve ever had? I bet that Ollie Horn has had one much, much worse than you....

EDINBURGH 2023: REVIEW: JINGLE STREET, Gilded Balloon Patter Hoose (Big Yin)
by Helen Smith - August 06, 2023

Some shows make you smile instinctively, and Jingle Street is one of them. Jingles, with their strong potential for catchy nonsense, lend themselves well to the world of musical theatre. The concept is funny and well executed, with overall silliness giving way at times to surprising emotion....

EDINBURGH 2023: Review: THE LAST SHOW BEFORE WE DIE, Roundabout @Summerhall
by Katie Kirkpatrick - August 06, 2023

With rolling around on the floor, confetti, a paddling pool, and a toothbrush, The Last Show Before We Die is one of the most bizarre shows of this year’s festival. At the same time however, it’s one of the most moving. At its core, this is a show about endings. Last Show is formed around interviews...

EDINBURGH 2023: Review: BACON, Summerhall
by Katie Kirkpatrick - August 05, 2023

In Sophie Swithinbank's award-winning Bacon, friendship and love are inextricable from danger, anger, and hurt. It's a play that lives on the boundaries, the scales constantly tipping - literally, as the set takes the form of an oversized seesaw. ...

EDINBURGH 2023: Review: GUNTER at Summerhall
by Cindy Marcolina - August 05, 2023

Gunter is an energetic, subtle, genuinely amusing, hard-hitting piece that ties the effects of violence and suspicion to the patriarchal structure and all its demands. Julia Grogan, Norah Lopez-Holden, and Hannah Jarrett-Scott materialise the story while Higman narrates it and contextualises it sitt...

EDINBURGH 2023: Review: HIGH STEAKS, Summerhall
by Cindy Marcolina - August 05, 2023

It’s a visceral, truthful, moving performance. Haines is genuinely funny, balancing the horror of the stats that surround labiaplasty. It’s an exceptionally well-researched production, medically and humanly. Directed by Louise Orwin and starring Haines’s mother too, it’s an important show that could...

EDINBURGH 2023: Review: HEAVEN, Traverse
by Cindy Marcolina - August 05, 2023

Jim Culleton directs Andrew Bennett and Janet Moran as they take turns to open up in conversational confessional style. They do so in a liminal space designed by Zia Bergin-Holly. The set is suspended between interior and exterior: the outside wall of a building, with its stripped posters and lonely...

EDINBURGH 2023: Review: WAITING FOR A TRAIN AT THE BUS STOP, Summerhall
by Cindy Marcolina - August 05, 2023

The poet and director crafts a poignant exploration of manipulation, coercive control, and domestic violence, infusing it with poetic interludes that are the definite highlight of the project....

Review: THROWN, Traverse Theatre
by Natalie O'Donoghue - August 06, 2023

Five wildly different women gather in the muddy fields of the Highland Games circuit to compete in the obscure art of Backhold Wrestling. The pearls are off, influencer videos posted, “Gucci bag” from the Barras set aside as the bold beginners attempt to become a team and win the championship. But n...

EDINBURGH 2023: Review: KEVIN QUANTUM: MOMENTUM, Assembly
by Natalie O'Donoghue - August 06, 2023

Epic scale stunts and mind-blowing magic in a spectacle that swings from edge-of-your-seat astonishment to belly laughs. Illusionist and inventor Kevin was trained by Penn & Teller, has had sell-outs at Edinburgh Fringe and reached the final stages of Britain's Got Talent with his death defying, stu...

EDINBURGH 2023: Review: THE BLACK BLUES BROTHERS, Assembly
by Natalie O'Donoghue - August 07, 2023

After thrilling the world, with more than 500,000 spectators and astonishing appearances at the Royal Variety Performance and Montecarlo Circus Festival, 'best circus show 2022' (TheatreWeekly.com) returns to Edinburgh... on a mission to entertain! Joining the energy of Africa with a rhythm 'n' blue...

Review: MADELEINE HAMILTON: PIPING HOT, Just The Tonic At The Caves - Just The Wee One
by Stefanie Lyons - August 04, 2023

Madeleine Hamilton blows. Her pipes. She blows her pipes and she blows them well. But this is not your average bagpipe show. Through the medium of Scotland's most famous instrument, Hamilton demonstrates with deft and witty imagination that these noise tubes are actually just like men, and falling i...

EDINBURGH 2023: Review: BREAKING OPEN, The Space
by Natalie O'Donoghue - August 06, 2023

Why would a woman leave her career as the lead singer of a multi-platinum band? Was it fate, family, or something else? When she hears a compelling voice within her closet, urging her to leave her marriage, Oskar must make a choice, stay and continue as is or take a bold step to find her voice and m...

EDINBURGH 2023: Review: KIERAN HODGSON: BIG IN SCOTLAND, Pleasance Courtyard
by Mark Carnochan - August 06, 2023

With Big in Scotland Kieran Hodgson proves that he is not just one of the greatest comedians of his generation but one of the best to have ever performed at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe....

EDINBURGH 2023: Review: POTTY THE PLANT, Gilded Balloon Patter Hoose - Doonstairs
by Helen Smith - August 04, 2023

Potty the Plant welcomes you to Little Boo Boo’s General Hospital, home to three haphazard nurses, a day-dreaming cleaner, a suspicious doctor - and a singing, dancing plant. An hour of escapist fun filled with catchy tunes. The show for people who want an hour of ridiculous, musical fun - led by a ...

EDINBURGH 2023: Review: OLGA KOCH: PRAWN COCKTAIL, Monkey Barrel Comedy (Monkey Barrel 1)
by Mark Carnochan - August 04, 2023

Olga Koch's latest show doesn't provide one of the smoothest hours at this years Fringe but does solidify Koch's place as one of the best on the comedy scene...

Review: BONNIE & CLYDE, Original West End Cast Recording
by Abbie Grundy - July 28, 2023

The Original West End Cast Recording of Bonnie & Clyde is a tense, cinematic treat....

Review: HENRY VI, Bard in the Botanics
by Natalie O'Donoghue - July 02, 2023

Henry IV has won the crown from Richard II but his country faces rebellion and his own health is failing. As the king prepares for war, his son Hal is living a life of infamy in the company of the notorious Sir John Falstaff....

Review: HEATHERS THE MUSICAL, King's Theatre, Glasgow
by Natalie O'Donoghue - June 28, 2023

Westerberg High’s Veronica Sawyer is just another nobody dreaming of a better day. But when she joins the beautiful and impossibly cruel Heathers, her dreams of popularity may finally come true. Meanwhile, mysterious teen rebel JD teaches her that it might kill to be a nobody, but it is murder being...

Review: THE GREAT REPLACEMENT, Oran Mor
by Natalie O'Donoghue - June 24, 2023

Fi and and her daughter Lu have never seen eye to eye but Lu’s ovaries are Fi’s last remaining hope of a grandchild. When avowedly single Lu presents some ‘interesting’ choices of sperm donor, Fi knows she should probably keep her mouth shut. She has always been open- minded and definitely not raci...

Review: BLOODBANK, Oran Mor
by Natalie O'Donoghue - June 18, 2023

Priya and Caris have an arrangement, a somewhat risqué arrangement for a Tory MP and an NHS nurse to have. When picture-perfect, bottom-of-the-barrel Bonnie interrupts this unusual pair, Priya sinks her fangs into a tasty, new opportunity....

Book Review: DRAMA GAMES FOR EXPLORING SHAKESPEARE, by Alanna Beeken
by Cheryl Markosky - June 14, 2023

Must-have, dip-in, flick-through book to help make Shakespeare's plays fun for actors, students, directors and teachers...

Review: THE STAMPING GROUND, King's Theatre, Glasgow
by Natalie O'Donoghue - June 14, 2023

When together-forever couple Euan and Annie return home, they’re seeking a fresh start for their teenage daughter. But there’s a heatwave in the Highlands and they soon find themselves lost in this once familiar place, now teeming with more tourists than residents......

Review: MEET ME AT THE KNOB, Oran Mor, Glasgow
by Natalie O'Donoghue - June 06, 2023

1920s Broomielaw in Glasgow was ruled by a little-remembered and little spoke about gang called the White Hats. This wasn’t your usual bunch of butch macho razor-boys, no, the White Hat Boys did it differently. They stole, sold their bodies, bribed government officials and wealthy clients with the t...

Review: STRICTLY BALLROOM, Theatre Royal, Glasgow
by Natalie O'Donoghue - June 06, 2023

Directed by Britain’s best loved TV Judge, Craig Revel Horwood, Strictly Ballroom: The Musical follows arrogant, rebellious young ballroom dancer, Scott Hastings (Kevin Clifton). When his radical and daring dance style sees him fall out of favour with Australian Federation, he must dance with beginn...