Right, well, willkommen and bienvenue to the first proper
day of the Ocelot 2013 tour of the Edinburgh Fringe. As ever, I am accompanied
by my travelling companion, wingwoman and scampo
di tutti scampi Herself, with whom I have booked a packed week of events
from comedy to musical, dance to magic, and all them other things what are on.
Except the kids’ shows, coz that would be weird. Besides, Bagpuss and Friends isn’t on this year.
For regular readers of the Pouch, you should know that this
year’s Fringe blogologue comes to you with Added Technology! For I have
borrowed Herself’s spare digital voice recorder Dictaphone thing, to facilitate
note-taking throughout the day. In times past, you might have seen me
frantically recording a pithy observation about street performers or student improv
troupes on a tiny actual paper notebook with an actual pencil, or else
muttering a clumsy mantra of notes to myself until such time as I can reach my
laptop back at base.
Not so this year – the thoughts come to you hot and fresh
and fast, straight from the Ocelot’s brain to you, via the medium of a small
handheld digital thingy that makes me look like a roving reporter or rogue
conspiracy theorist. The only downside is that I have to now repeatedly
playback my own foul nasal grunts to figure out what on Earth I was saying, but
fortunately you are spared this unpleasantness.
Oh, one other fun thing about the Dictaphone – when you use
the back and forward buttons to steer through tracks, it makes high pitched
bleeps just like an old Binatone Pong machine. Magic.
Not content with Added Verbal Technology, I have also
invested in the cheapest possibly (but fetchingly purple) digital cameras this
year. So far I have taken two photos, one of a misaligned advert hoarding which
has managed to miss out the central section of a woman’s face, in the style of
phossy jaw or a radical LeFort surgery, and the other of an impressive radio
mast in Harraby, south of Carlisle. Rest assured the Ocelot will be treating
you to the entire photo album at the end.
You should be aware that I have not read the instructions
for any of my new devices, content to bumble through with the minimum possibly
button knowledge. This leaves my brain free for more important things. Like
repeatedly singing the first line of the ‘Alexander and Sergei’ Ebony and Ivory
ad, apparently. Gah.
Remind me to walk you through (not literally obviously, that
would be a squeeze) the contents of the Ocelot’s actual Fringe rucksack, which
has been scientifically stocked with everything the hardcore Fringer might need
for a day on the streets of Edinburgh – map of venues, rolled up rain poncho
thing, shortbread, spare batteries for Added Technology, tissues, souvenir
Henning Wehn My Struggle pen,
emergency hair scrunchies, super glue for reattaching Herself’s errant gel
nails and many more indispensable items.
See also the Ocelot’s Bat-Utility Pants, which were chosen
specially from the boys’ section of Peacocks for its superior extra pocketage.
Only problem is that a) they accentuate the Ocelot’s already mannish physique
and b) they are the unfortunate colour of baby poo (probably ‘camel’).
A final word of praise for the excellent Ashbourne House
B&B – they stock their rooms with high quality Johnson and Johnson cotton
buds, that most versatile and ear-friendly of implements. Well done the nice
lady who runs the place.
We start today in Carlisle, heading out in our trusty
vehicle Elwood for points north, choosing to eschew the obvious choice of ‘straight
up the motorway to Glasgow and then turn right’ for the more scenic (and
direct) route of the A7 (‘historic route to Edinburgh’).
As we leave Carlisle, we see the same blue-haired, large
bottomed young lady that we passed yesterday on our way into town. Either this
is sheer coincidence or The City Is Full Of Identical Blue Haired Fat Bottomed
Girls! I prefer the second theory.
We pass a local police car, bearing the motto ‘Safer,
Stronger, Cumbria’ which was no doubt modelled on the ‘Faster Better Renner’ strap
line for the Bourne Legacy. Shortly thereafter we pass a building emblazoned
with ‘Kengas Living Flame Centre’. I am disappointed to discover that it is
shop for stoves and heating, and not a Zoroastrian Temple. Tch.
We drive through Longtown in Cumbria on the A7, which is
very pretty indeed, and see a strange conical stone structure up on a hill
outside Teviothead. See, that’s proper travellogging right there…
As the day progresses, I find that I become less
self-conscious about talking into the Dictaphone thing. At first very embarrassed
when talking in front of Herself, I realise it’s much easier to make a verbal
note if I speak it directly to her and just happen to have the recorder turned
on at the same time. This has the added advantage of making it a more
conversational affair between us. This may be the beginning of some sort of
popular spoken blog thing featuring the two of us. What are they called? Pods
or something? God, my mind is going. Podcasts.
This year our now legendary Fringe timetabling efforts have
reached new heights, as we are sporting personalised t-shirts with our week’s
events printed thereon, for ease of reference (though this does necessitate a
lot of staring at each other’s chests, and invite the same from total
strangers, as we soon discover). Not only that, but Herself is now armed with a
handy set of laminated A6 timetablets (I just made that up), attached neatly to
her hip (not actually her hip, her trousers. Honestly). They also make for
excellent fly swatters.
Came up with an idea for a great new Fringe show, combining
two popular acts from the Far East, simply entitled Shaolin Ladyboys. I’d see it.
OK enough waffle. On with the show reviews.
Arthur’s Quest: A
Medieval Musical
theSpace @ Venue 45
… and not theOtherSpace in the venue next door. We’d sat
through 5 minutes of a mixed media two – woman show about a Chinese woman
writer in London before we had to sneak out (I let the door bang on my exit, oh
the shame) and trot 100 yards down Jeffery’s Street to the right Venue 45.
Argh.
Anyhoo, Arthur’s Quest is a nicely short 45 minute show
featuring about five performers (a couple more appeared right at the end;
perhaps they’re shy) with decent songs and a simple story about a lad and a
girl and a wicked step mum in a castle. The chap who plays Merlin (with an
accordion!) is like a cross between Matt Smitt, Simon Farnaby (he of Horrible Histories’ Stupid Deaths) and
Treguard from Knightmare. Which is a
good thing.
The young people can all act and sing and play
instruments rather well, and the simple props and back projection works
perfectly well in the three sided Space. Well done, the young people. Though as
Herself correctly states, there is no earthly reason for the characters to be
called Arthur, Merlin or Guinevere, as they’re not that Arthur, Merlin or Guinevere anyway. A Medieval Musical would have been a perfectly good title on its
own.
Ben Hart: The Outsider
Underbelly
Ah, Underbelly, how we dislike your cramped multi-storey workhouse
venue. But if we are to see this young magician, that is where we must go just
this once. The slender Ben Hart is younger than his moody Jensen Ackles promo
poster suggests, but he is already an accomplished sleight of hander with an
engaging natural manner. Some of the tricks didn't come off (I think, bit hard
to tell), and there may have been a couple of stooges in the front row. Still
and all, he has very clever fingers and a nice smile, which should take him far
on and off stage.
Executed for Sodomy
The Life Story of Caterina Linck
C Nova
Because everyone should see at least one transgender leather
dildo sodomy trial play, right? Very well acted by all three female performers,
though annoyingly the cast list does not say who plays who. And apparently
written by two chaps, who get into the variously-gendered characters’ heads
very well.
This is Proper Theatre, inasmuch as there is no set, minimal
props and lots of falling down and emoting and stuff. This is Herself’s
highlight of the day and it is rather good. I liked the carved wooden guns.
We then explore the rest of the C Nova venue in search off
the excellently effed Free Fringe Film
Festival. It turns out to be a room tucked away on the second floor, with
comfy sofas and a projector playing a series of 5 minute films (all black and
white thus far). After some technical problems, it is up and running, and we enjoy
a documentary about an insomniac bagel baker on Brick Lane, a man caught
wanking before a funeral by his wife (sound quality not good enough for us to
catch the punchline of exactly what material online he was using to ‘engage’),
and a silent called Who Will I Play With Now?, which featured a rather charming
central man-child character.
Worth remembering as a nice dark place to sit down on a
comfy sofa without having to buy a drink…
Henning Wehn’s
Authentic German Christmas Do
Just The Tonic at the
Caves
I am getting to loathe all these ‘venue @ place’
designations. Can it not just be The Caves, or Just The Tonic? It’s like True
Steppers featuring Dane Bowers and Victoria Beckman all over again. I don’t
know where I am.
Any road up, we joined a somewhat older crowd (and surprisingly
German-literate) at this second preview of Henning’s German Christmas show.
There are German carols to be sung, which we stumble through at a mournful
pace, and I would suggest keyboardist Elaine Cheng steps up the tempo in future
gigs. Also, just do one verse of each song. Still, Henning is enthusiastic and entertaining
as ever, and where else are you going to get comedy structured around
rebuilding Britain’s ailing manufacturing base?
We meet other old people in the crowd with colour coded
timetables and exchange mutually congratulatory admirations. But they do not
have t-shirts or lammies. Thus we are still win.
Voices In Your Head
Pleasance Beneath
And finally to Pleasance for our last show of the day, which
we know little about, but suggests top Fringe comical people responding to an
off-stage voice in some manner, perhaps like Snog,
Marry, Avoid. As it turns out, there are four guest performers, from whom I
recognise Thom Tuck from the Penny Dreadfuls (and Radio 4’s Sketchorama) and Sarah Pascoe. Matt Richardson and Ian Smith (named
after the Rhodesia bloke?) I do not know but are also good.
Basically, the disembodied female Voice directs them,
through leading and amusing interview questions and a few props supplied by a
complicit audience, to improvise weird-ass characters, either singly or in
pairs. Tom Tuck’s maniacal brain-napping museum guard Alan and Sarah Pascoe’s
queen bee are highly entertaining, but all four are clearly enjoying the
freestyling format and rolling up at each other’s performances. My favourite
show of the day.
Then back down Cowgate to base camp. With every passing
year, Cowgate - Edinburgh’s Gutter - becomes more like Birmingham’s Broad Street,
which a slightly dangerous mixture of late night bars, meandering drunken hens
on towering fleshtone high heels (what’s with that anyway? Is the intention to
look like your own actual feet have hideous pointy heel protrusions?),
meandering drunken men looking for a snog and/or fight, and the usual sad smattering
of homeless people. This is also, I believe where our fellow Fringers Dr Foot
and his heterosexual Fringemate Mitchell are staying, in one of the posher
hostels. God alone know if they’ll get any sleep tonight.
Another future Fringe show, a musical based on the words of
Edgar Allan Poe: Brimful of Usher.
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