Pleasance Courtyard

This review is from London, July 2023. ‘The Smeds and the Smoos’ transfers to the 2024 Edinburgh Fringe. Kids’ theatre company Tall Stories has been touring its stage version of ‘The Gruffalo’ for over 20 years now – it’s almost the same age as Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler’s iconic picture book. Though the company has dipped its toes in other waters, there’s no denying that it has found a niche: the other shows in its current repertoire are a version of ‘Gruffalo’ sequel ‘The Gruffalo’s Child’ (returning to the West End this Christmas!), plus Donaldson and Scheffler’s much-loved ‘The Snail and the Whale’ and ‘The Smeds and the Smoos’. Directed by Toby Mitchell, latest show ‘The Smeds…’ has been knocking around in touring form for a year or so but finally makes its West End debut this summer. And it’s very charming, in a predictable way. Tall Stories is ruthlessly efficient at the whole ‘take a bedtime story that you can read in five minutes and stretch it to an hour’ thing. An opening reference to ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’ is a hoot, there are some nice songs from John Fiber and Andy Shaw, and Barney George’s sets and Yvonne Stone’s puppets do a decent job of channelling Scheffler’s eccentric, cuddly vision of space, as feuding tribes of aliens – the red Smeds and the blue Smoos – set out on a galactic odyssey to find their youngsters Bill and Janet, who have eloped together.  Though it can’t really compete in visual pizazz with the BBC’s recent animated version, it is pr

The current war in Gaza – and the Israeli-Palestine ‘situation’ more generally – is a difficult topic to really focus on at the comedy-centric Edinburgh Fringe. This play from Israeli-Palestinian British theatre company Floating Shed is not exactly about that. But it does feel highly relevant, a drama about conscription into the IDF based on playwright Nadav Burstein’s own experiences of being drafted as a teen. Having already racked up some minor awards wins already, it’s definitely one to watch. 

Queer mischief makers Awkward Productions turn in a very unconventional Christmas show.  ‘Gwyneth Goes Skiing’ is a tongue-in-cheek dramatisation/‘dramatisation’ of Gwyneth Paltrow’s 2016 ski slope collision with a retired optometrist from Utah, and the globally scrutinised court case that arose from it earlier this year. Linus Karp stars as Gwynnie, with Joseph Martin as the hapless optometrist Terry Sanderson. Expect extreme seasonal silliness. Strictly 18-plus.

Cult character comic Emma Sidi may just have her long-awaited breakthrough at this year’s Fringe thanks to prominent recent turns in ‘Taskmaster’ and ‘Starstruck’ (amongst others) plus an undeniably weirdly topical new show. ‘Emma Sidi Is Sue Gray’ could have been an eccentric flashback to a figure whose fame peaked in 2022 with erstwhile civil servant Gray’s report into illegal Tory gatherings during social distancing; but with the snap election and colossal Labour win, Gray is now chief of staff to the Prime Minister of the UK. Whether any of this really matters hugely given Sidi’s rather whimisical sense of humour is TBC. 

US comedy writer, podcast and media personality Demi Adejuyigbe is relatively little known in the UK, although ‘he was a writer on “The Good Place”‘ shopudl ring a few bells. Now he’s taking a shot at UK glory with his Edinburgh Fringe debut in which he will combine songs, jokes and – we are sincerely promised – a single backflip. 

The still disgustingly young Ania Magliano has established herself as a Fringe powerhouse since she debuted in 2022, last year selling her entire run out in advance. Her slick, sardonic tales of Gen-Z life go down smooth but are disarmingly subversive. She returns with a new show that is possibly themed around her penchant for confessing her darkest secrets to strangers, but should be heaps of nonchalent fun regardless.

The sharp-as-nails ‘Taskmaster’ champion returns to standup duties with this new show. Sophie Duker’s not telling us much about ‘But Daddy I Love You’, but it has a cute poster image and she describes it as ‘delusional’. Whatever the case, expect entertainment and provocation in roughly equal measures.

Outlandish US comic Harrison performed an extensive work in progress run of this spicily-named show at last year’s Fringe, and while we weren’t able to review it, we can confirm that it was both hilarious and outrageous and that we’ll never look on the cartoon charcter Stewart Little the same ever again. Unless it’s gone dramatically downhill it’s a serious must see for 2024. 

This revival of Katie Mitchell's National Theatre adaptation of Dr Seuss's 'The Cat In The Hat' has been doing the rounds as a touring shows for years, and is a delightfully zany fixture of the Edinburgh Fringe. It’s rather slimmed down since its NT days (and Mitchell hasn’t had anything to do with it for aeons) but it retains the wonderful looking flat sets and props of her original vision. Based on the madcap evocative children's books, the show follows Sally and her brother when they meet a mischievous cat. Ages three-plus.

US comic Catherine Cohen scored a big buzzy breakthrough hit pre-pandemic with her hilariously ironic hit ‘The Twist…? She’s Gorgeous’ in which she cast herself as a deluded glamourpuss diva with amusing results. Follow up ‘Come for Me’ had a work-in-progress run at last year’s fringe and should be ready to debut officially as one of this year’s most anticipated shows. It’s being billed as ‘an openly glamorous, decidedly horny comedy cabaret exploration of what it means to enter your thirties as a woman online, in love, and freezing your eggs’.