Amateurs
Showcase 2026 – Dream as One
★★★★☆ Appealing
In 36 years Showcase has raised over £385 000 for Macmillan Cancer Care, and the annual production at the Church Hill continues to provide an upbeat and thoroughly entertaining selection of music.
Double Bill
★★★★☆ Accomplished
Double Bill from the Edinburgh Makars at the Royal Scots Club for the Fringe’s final week features two contrasting plays in Fool’s Errand and Still Life, and provides excellent value for one ticket.
Necessary Cat’s shrewish double bill
The Taming of the Shrew
The Tamer Tamed or The Woman’s Prize
This year’s double bill from Necessary Cat resurrects a 400 year old conversation between two early modern comedies
Carrie: The Musical
★★★★☆ Electrifying
Carrie: The Musical from the Edinburgh University Footlights at Paradise in Augustines is a gory and emotional adaptation of Stephen King’s novel, with music by Michael Gore and lyrics by Dean Pitchford.
Alan Bennett’s Talking Heads 1
Her Big Chance & A Cream Cracker Under the Settee
★★★★☆ Poignant
This pair of quietly devastating dramatic monologues from Alan Bennett’s Talking Heads series, while written (and firmly rooted) in the 1980s, still stand up as tragicomic meditations on loneliness.
Cluedo
★★★★☆ Farcical
Cluedo, from Edinburgh Theatre Arts at St Ninian’s for the first two weeks of the Fringe, is a lively parody of the murder mystery genre, performed with pace and panache.
The Farndale Avenue Housing Estate Townswomen’s Guild Dramatic Society’s Production of Macbeth
★★★★☆ Cheery
Edinburgh People’s Theatre’s extraordinary Fringe pedigree continues at Newington Trinity Church with a play whose title is nearly as long as EPT’s time at the Fringe – The Farndale Avenue Housing Estate Townswomen’s Guild Dramatic Society’s Production of Macbeth.
Countdown
★★★☆☆ Evocative
Countdown from Theatre Paradok at theSpace Triplex, is an ensemble piece exploring the mounting pressure facing teaching staff, based on the real experiences of young teachers across the UK and Singapore.
Chicago: Teen Edition
★★★★☆ Glorious
Captivate Theatre presents Chicago: Teen Edition, a marginally toned-down version of the vaudeville-style musical about celebrity culture in 1920s Chicago, featuring murderesses vying for public adoration.
The Bear
★★★★☆ Fast and furious
Chekov called his own short play, The Bear, a ‘stupid vaudeville’, but it takes smarts and sass to really bring it to life after nearly 140 years, and this production delivers hilariously.
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