Last night the International Festival opened its doors. Most of the different Festivals - Jazz, Film, Book, Interactive, Television, Art, International and Fringe - coincide happily together but there is always a bit of needling between the Fringe and the International, mainly because both are after the same theatre audience. Relationships were at their worst a few years ago when Paul Gudgin, the Fringe supremo, decided to start and finish his festival a week earlier without consulting Brian McMaster, the artistic director of the International Festival. McMaster was so angry that for a while he kept his best shows until the final week after the Fringe audience had gone home.
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The differences between the two events are huge. The Fringe is like a huge party to which anyone can come. As long as you can find a venue and have the means to lose a not insubstantial sum of money then you can stand onstage and read the Slough phone book if you want to. That lottery can be exhilarating for the punters, or, after a day of seeing nothing but rubbish, deeply depressing. The mechanics of the Fringe means that there is always another show waiting in the wings and shows are only allowed to play for just over an hour (that's a relief if the piece is truly dreadful). Scenery has to be simple so it can be whisked on and off at the beginning and end.
There can be too much froth on the Fringe, and in contrast you go to the International Festival in search of meat, to see demanding productions that sometimes go on for hours. McMaster has invited the world's most famous directors here including Robert Lepage and Calixto Bieito. Sometimes the International Festival has attempted to party too but rarely with much joy. McMaster's dabbling with eurocomedy in the past has never been particularly successful.
There are huge pressures on the International programme. A high standard of design is expected - a welcome relief from the ubiquitous black drapes on the Fringe - but the directors do not have the usual number of previews to get the technical stuff right. A few years ago Robert Lepage was forced to cancel his technically complicated production of 'Elsinore' altogether.
Peter Stein is a festival favourite. Last year, he staged David Harrower's controversial 'Blackbird' a neat marriage of an international director and a Scottish playwright. This year, he is directing 'Troilus and Cressida' in a joint production with the RSC. Stein's sets are usually extremely complicated way beyond anything that would be possible on the Fringe. When 'The Hairy Ape' came to the National many years ago, the interval on press night was almost an hour long.
This morning Stein is quoted in the Guardian as saying he couldn't be bothered with the Fringe as 'I come from the professional theatre and I like discipline, I like cleanness, I like perfection and the Fringe is playing with the exact opposite.' It's a statement that Stein must be regretting today. Professionalism, discipline and perfection were just what was missing from last night's opening. The entire performance was brought to a halt in the interval due to technical hitches and everyone had to be sent home. The audience wandered around wondering what was going on as if the problems of Heathrow had arrived at Edinburgh's Kings Theatre. No doubt, the unprofessional, imperfect Fringe is deeply sympathetic.
Edinburgh, Glasgow, Lothian & Fife
