Q Where do you stay?
A In the New Town area of Edinburgh, its a long haul up to the Royal Mile but all downhill from the Assembly Rooms in George Street in the evenings.
Q When do you book accommodation?
A A year before
Q How do you travel?
A Easyjet to Edinburgh airport, then taxi or bus to the city - about 30 mins. Again - book travel as soon as possible.
Q How do you choose which shows to see?
A Answer
PRIOR TO THE FRINGE
Gone are the glorious days when the Edinburgh Fringe were able to keep a lid on things until they release the comprehensive brochure in June each year. Nowadays, some venues offer tickets as early as Jan/Feb and its relatively easy, by keeping an eye on the press, to see who will be there. Our strategy is to see what’s on at The Traverse Theatre, as the productions they stage usually collect a bucketload of awards, then fit in shows around this.
Once the Fringe guide is out, we sift through and see if any recognisable names pop up, ie playwrights from some of the cutting edge London theatres or theatre companies we are familiar with.
You may want to organise your shows by area by perhaps spending the day in the Pleasance Courtyard seeing their programme, they produce a great separate guide to their performances. The Pleasance isn’t too far from Bristo Square which houses the Udderbelly (huge inflated purple cow on it’s back - can’t miss it) and the Gilded Balloon venues, amongst others, and so you can see plenty by not moving too far.
WHILE AT THE FRINGE
There are posters and flyers galore!! Walk down the Royal Mile in the mornings as the performers give you their spiel and beg you to buy tickets.
Keep an eye on the Fringe daily publications, The Skinny, for instance for reviews or grab The Scotsman Newspaper daily and also keep an eye on their website.
FRINGE FIRST AWARDS - The Scotsman Newspaper awards a FRINGE FIRST weekly to several performances. It’s a fabulous feeling when you’ve seen something stonkingly good and then see it confirmed with a FRINGE FIRST, it sort of suggests you can pick out good stuff.
Each venue will paste reviews across posters publicising its shows, volunteers and wanabees spend ages cutting and stapling strips of reviews to individual flyers
TALK!!!! Queue’s are brilliant forums for finding out what others have seen that’s good, we’ve booked many a ticket on the strength of some other punter’s reccommendation.
Q How much are tickets?
A Ticket prices vary and some events are free - don’t forget all the street entertainment too
Q Which are the main venues?
A Pleasance Courtyard, good for star spotting too, The Assembly Rooms at George Square and on The Mound, The Traverse, and the Udderbelly.<
Q Is it all Comedy?
A Hell no! Theatre, Physical Theatre, Music, Comedy, Events - something for everyone including kids.
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