Ed Fringe and it's art infused oddities....

Tis that time of year again....time to don your tartan and ingest some art infused oddities at this years Edinburgh Festival Fringe one of which includes us, The Lady Boys of Bangkok. Ed Fringe holds special place in our hearts as it was where we held the first production of our show 16 years ago; a show which is......lets face it is rather an odd mixture of fun, frolics and Lady Boys! It's kind of show that Edinburgh Fringe not only attracts, but also helps to promote and flourish as it's own entity and it's the incredibly warm reception we received from the audiences there all that time ago that spurred us on to still be performing to this day! So basically this blog is about all things Fringe this month as it takes over Edinburgh, in homage to the worlds largest arts festival.

The Fringe Festival started life in on the back of the Edinburgh International Festival in 1947, when 8 theatre companies turned up uninvited to perform shows in Edinburgh, taking advantage of large theatre crowds. They used these willing participants as Guinea Pigs of sorts, testing their own alternative theatre styles. Since these humble beginnings Fringe has grown exponentially into the largest arts festival in the world and has become synonymous with alternative and 'out there' acts, considered on the to be on the.....Fringe of the theatrical performance spectrum! Word play, gotta love it. In line with this bohemian anything goes persona the festival is unjuried - meaning no acts are selected and basically opening the flood gates to a menagerie of experimental works which you wouldn't see at more elevated brow events....acts including The Lady Boys of Bangkok. 

With 49,497 performances of 3,193 shows in 299 venues  at this years festival, it's kind of tough to cover them all. One of the highlights however has to be Jeremy Paxman's (of Newsnight and also beard fame) very own stage show rather simply entitled PAXO. Now what you may be dreaming of is a chance to grill Paxo as he has so famously done to many politicians and other figure heads in his time, and this would be your chance - with a good old fashioned grilling session being one aspect of the show, just don't mention Angela Merkel.

Edinburgh Fringe is known for it focus on comedic acts - who doesn't love a good stand up? This year is no different in that respect with many big name stars making there way up to Old Smokey to test their new material of hopefully receptive audiences. These range from big names like Jimmy Carr, to old names like Ruby Wax and lesser known people such as Kerry Goldliman, who stars with Ricky Gervais in Derek. Obligatory celebrity name drop over - this lean towards comedy at the Fringe leads to some pretty ingenious show titles, here's some of our favourites: Gavin Webster: A Controversial Title in Order to Sell Tickets, the rather depressingly named Andrew Lawrence: Reasons to Kill Yourself and our personal favourite that were sure Lewis Carroll would love -  Rob Rouse: Through the Looking Ass.

With all this and more to be seen at Ed Fringe 2014 (purposeful rhyme btw *takes a bow) don't forget that the Lady Boys of Bangkok are here between the 2nd - 24th and the one and only Sabai Pavilion is in Meadows! So make sure you come on down and say hello...........or should we say Swasdi.