With August fast approaching, we asked our top team of Edinburgh Fringe critics to each choose the three shows they are most looking forward to seeing at this year’s festival: from juggling Bob Dylan to Scottish witch hunters, from Su Pollard to Michael Barrymore

Blackout

Conceived and written by Mark Jeary, Blackout is, in part, a response to his own battle with alcoholism. He goes further though, in a verbatim text which examines common attitudes to alcoholism and alcoholics to argue just how outdated they are, while showing how much other elements such as gender impact on alcoholism and those it effects.

One Life Stand

Middle Child Theatre’s gig-theatre production of Luke Barnes’ All We Ever Wanted Was Everything was the best shows at last year’s festival – an exuberant, apocalyptic story of two dissatisfied millennials stuffed full of tunes and euphoria (it’s back this year, for a short run, by the way). The company’s new show, written by Eve Nicol with music from James Frewer and Glaswegian duo Honeyblood, is a late-night search for intimacy, exploring the loneliness lurking behind the screens of modern-day dating apps. It heads to Edinburgh after appearing in Hull and at Latitude.

Everything Not Saved

Middle Child Theatre’s gig-theatre production of Luke Barnes’ All We Ever Wanted Was Everything was the best shows at last year’s festival – an exuberant, apocalyptic story of two dissatisfied millennials stuffed full of tunes and euphoria (it’s back this year, for a short run, by the way). The company’s new show, written by Eve Nicol with music from James Frewer and Glaswegian duo Honeyblood, is a late-night search for intimacy, exploring the loneliness lurking behind the screens of modern-day dating apps. It heads to Edinburgh after appearing in Hull and at Latitude.

Sticks and Stones / Island Town

Written by BAFTA-nominee Vinay Patel and Simon Longman (Sparks, Gundog), and presented by new writing company Paines Plough as part of its Roundabout season, Sticks and Stones explores what happens when a joke goes awry in the age of social media, while Island Town examines small town life and three friends aching for freedom.

My Kind of Michael

I enjoyed Nick Cassenbaum’s exploration of the world of the schvitz in his self-penned Bubble Schmeisis. This year the theatremaker turns his hand to the troubled legend that is Michael Barrymore. Cassenbaum is a consummate storyteller using music and gentle comedy to create his own version of Barrymore’s well-publicised rise and fall. Created by Nick Cassenbaum and Danny Braverman, My Kind of Michael has been developed with the Yard and features music by Andy Kelly.