Edinburgh Festival Fringe 2017: drop everything and book these

The Stage / Natasha Tripney


The 2017 Edinburgh Festival Fringe programme has landed. We’ll be diving in to its pages deeper at a later date, once we’re suitably armed with highlighter pens, snacks and emergency gin – but here are our top 10 picks following an initial, somewhat excitable, skim-read.

3. All We Ever Wanted Was Everything – Summerhall, 20.45

Hull-based company Middle Child, the company responsible for gig-theatre excellence in the form of the raucous, but also unexpectedly moving, Weekend Rockstars (pictured), brings its new show to Paines Plough’s Roundabout space. All We Ever Wanted Was Everything has a story spanning three decades. You can also catch it in Hull until June 17.

4. Dollywould – Summerhall, 21.15

Sh!t Theatre, the company behind one of the funniest and most timely of last year’s show, Letters to Windsor House, a piece about the emotional, social and psychological impact of the housing crisis. This year Rebecca Biscuit and Louise Mothersole are back at Summerhall with a show inspired by Dolly Parton – but will it contain anything as stupidly catchy as their Rob Jecock song?

6. Salt – Summerhall, 14.30

Selina Thompson’s show, Salt, about her experiences retracing the Transatlantic Slave Triangle and the intersection of racial and gender identity, was first glimpsed at Bristol’s Mayfest last year. The completed piece is part of Northern Stage’s progamme at Summerhall.

 

8. Start Swimming – Summerhall, 14.40

James Fritz is a huge talent. He’s one of the most exciting new writers around at the moment. His past work includes the inky, unsettling Ross and Rachel and the majestically tense Four Minutes Twelve Seconds, and a new play of his, Parliament Square, has just been announced as part of the Royal Exchange’s autumn season. if his name is attached to something, consider me interested. This Young Vic Taking Part production is about “revolution and the future of our youth”.