Edinburgh festival 2024: 20 theatre shows making a scene this summer
With subjects ranging from the deadly serious to the downright silly, this year’s shows include plays about addiction, politics, funk and Come Dine With Me
March 2024
Don’t. Make. Tea. review – the disability benefits interview as Kafkaesque comic nightmare
A former police officer with muscular dystrophy fights a grotesquely bureaucratic system in this subversive satirical broadside
December 2023
Same Team: A Street Soccer Story review – high drama on and off the pitch
Robbie Gordon and Jack Nurse’s tale follows a team of Scots women’s footballers, but its most powerful scenes move well beyond the game
August 2023
Thrown review – backhold wrestling tale tackles Scottish identity
Sean and Daro Flake It ’Til They Make It review – sharp-talking Glasgow comedy
No Love Songs review – new parents are torn apart in gig-theatre show
Heaven review – the bittersweet taste of love
May 2023
Dear Billy review – brilliant tribute to the Big Yin
Gary McNair delivers verbatim interviews and misremembered Connolly routines from ordinary people in this love letter
April 2023
Stornoway, Quebec review – outlaws settle scores with Gaelic swagger
Calum L Macleòid’s western-style drama pits a gunslinging Elspeth Turner against a notorious fugitive in a peculiarly Scottish corner of Canada
November 2022
Watch out for snowball-firing robots! 25 of the best UK stage shows this Christmas
Ian McKellen in Mother Goose, Robin Hood as a rock’n’roll panto, a circus spin on The Little Prince and glitter galore … it’s our selection box of festive theatre
August 2022
Happy Meal review – romance blooms online and IRL
Jump for joy! Edinburgh festival 2022 takes off – in pictures
August 2021
Still review – a tale of constant pain and impending chaos
Medicine review – Domhnall Gleeson despairs in absurdist institutional limbo
July 2021
Camels, clowns and sex education: what to see at Edinburgh fringe 2021
The festival has shrunk because of Covid but there are plenty of shows in person and online this summer – here’s our pick of the first to be announced
January 2021
Jim Haynes obituary
Indefatigable leading light in the arts counterculture who founded the Traverse theatre and campaigned for sexual liberation
December 2020
Mustard review – one-woman show doesn't quite cut it
Lockdown culture
Mustard review – stinging tale of love, revenge and condiment addiction
November 2020
Lockdown culture
The Journey review – a polished magic show in search of deeper meaning
Playing to a live online audience, mind-reader Scott Silven appears to know our thoughts before we do
August 2020
Lesbian love story wins Popcorn Writing award for new play Edinburgh never got to see
Jennifer Lunn wins £2,500 prize for drama Es and Flo, whose fringe premiere was sabotaged by the Covid pandemic
