Edinburgh Festival

Remember when your religion teacher taught you about ridin’? And the school nurse told you to shave your pits? Or here, discovering your clit the first time? Wait, you haven’t yet? You don’t wank? Women don’t? My hole they don’t. Stick two fingers up and come with us on a journey back to your teenage self, to being scundered, to self discovery, to abstinence-only sex education, to Northern Ireland; a country of wankers.

Designed specifically to be experienced with headphones, alone, with the lights off and the curtains drawn, Covid Lockdown Breath Machine is a fantastical, transformative and uplifting binaural adventure into the symptoms and imaginings of a coronavirus patient. A woman on the edge of collapse battles a fever as the sweats carry her inside her body. While the world battles coronavirus, one woman searches for answers in her fever dreams. Take a breath and let this breeze whisk you to a world of kaleidoscopes, household gods and mushroom spores on a fresh but capricious westerly wind.

Dishonour is a powerful drama that explores the terrifying practice of female genital mutilation (FGM). Mimi, who plays all six characters, immerses viewers in the difficult truths of the FGM culture.

A new online one-woman show digitally broadcast from East London's leading drag club, The Glory. A hilarious and provocative dive into privilege and sexuality, we follow the story of a private tutor juggling teaching the UK's elite with high-kicking disco balls on a school night.

A hypnotic dreamscape. Through binaural sound audiences are drawn into the mind of a woman who grew up with severe depression and BPD, as she tries to find the answer to who she was, how she came to be that person, who she might have been and who she is now. The audience is taken right to the heart of the most difficult memories, that ultimately transcend the past and point the way to a different future. A future where the memories lose their grip, and with that loss, the power of the abuser fades.

My Car Plays Tapes is the new storytelling show by John Osborne, about getting older, jobs, cars that don’t really work and how to make big decisions with your life.

Tom Mayhew is a professional comedian. Well, he was. Over the last 18 months, he has sold out West End venues and signed on; he then stopped signing on to perform his own Radio 4 stand-up series. It's been both the most and least successful period of his career.

400 milliliters. That's how much liquid was drained from Michael's left testicle when he was a teenager. That's more than a can of coke. He should have told someone sooner, but who could he turn to? His dad died ten years ago, and besides, school is full of rumours about what the giant bulge in his trousers actually is. Who wants to stop that? The true story of a Belfast boy growing up with no father to guide him through and a giant ball.

The Victorian era’s toy theater movement collides with digital theater in this critically acclaimed, epic, table-top, sci-fi adventure. An astronaut crew crash lands on an unfamiliar planet in the distant future and are enslaved by a society where grapes have evolved into speaking creatures with human-like intelligence. “It’s a madhouse!”

The climate apocalypse has hit. Dublin's completely underwater. Best friends Bláthnaid and Debs are the sole survivors, living on the top floor of Liberty Hall. With only seagulls for company, they spend their days sheltering from the storms and reminiscing over the last days of Dublin. Debs looks to the future, but Bláthnaid is tormented by guilt. Why were they blind to the wave that was coming? And can they salvage a future from the wreckage? Afloat explores loss, sisterhood, and climate anxiety. From the makers of Fringe First winner, Mustard

Meet Davy. The things he sees. His streets. His mates. His girl and… The Boys. ‘It is what it is. It’s hard to say what it is. It’s just, you know. What it is.’ East Belfast Boy goes digital. Filmed throughout East Belfast in the summer of 2020 and directed by Emma Jordan, East Belfast Boy features a stunning physical performance by dancer Ryan O’Neill, with voiceover by actor Terrence Keeley and a thrilling updated soundtrack by Phil Kieran.

‘My name is mandla. It means power. I gave it to myself’ – mandla rae has a selective memory and they are scrambling to piece together their life. Through the exploration of mandla’s fragmented asylum and migration memories, as british as a watermelon asks questions about belonging, trauma and forgiveness. Told through an unflinching autofiction narrative weaving poetry and storytelling set within a chaotically colourful, sensory performance space and imagined entirely for the camera with film maker Graham Clayton-Chance; join mandla as they rise from the dead and reclaim their misplaced power.

“I wish Justine would leave me alone, so I could imagine being with her.” Anna has the perfect girlfriend, job and family- in her head. If you can dream it, why do you need to achieve it? When Justine crashes into Anna’s life and her fantasies, she has to make an unsettling choice. In this darkly comic, queer audio play, you share Anna’s headphones to plummet into the power and pain of imagination.

A hell of a lot can happen in the time you await the results of a pregnancy test. This is the story of a woman staring down the barrel of motherhood, torn between her own ambivalence... and an uncontrollable urge to push. Award-winning Popelei burst out of isolation and onto your screens with their darkly comic theatre production, reimagined for film. Blistering honesty, exhilarating choreography, and one extremely knocked-up performer.

A referential piece of immersive digital theatre set in a flat that's been possessed – Poltergeist style – by the ghost of pop-cultural masculinities. The Gash gals find themselves stuck, forced to encounter chit-chatting desk lamps, harmonising closet drawers, a TV that plays nothing but romcoms, a werewolf singing classic rock and way too many Rick and Morty references (one). In this macho world, they grapple with romance, bisexuality, their fears of men and how they'll connect with other people once they finally escape.

Melissa Center is... Marrying Jake Gyllenhaal. No really – she is! What starts out as her Jewish mom's pesky fantasy (and mild-to-moderate... OK, major obsession) turns into a full-on mission as Melissa, single, struggling and *cough* *cough* approaching 40, searches for love (and Jake Gyllenhaal). There will be Jewish moms (or just the one). There will be bad dates. There will be music. There will be stalking. There will be laughter... and some tears. There will be a wedding. There will be Jake. (And, in some way shape or form, Melissa Center will do them all).

A comedy about four working-class friends, Nick, Dan, Michelle and Lucy. Nick is not a fan of Christmas due to family issues but his partner Lucy is leaving the country shortly, so he is trying to make it a good night for her sake. They have a movie night in during a snowstorm but are stuck watching Freeview so they struggle to find something Christmassy to watch. They get into the holiday spirit by talking about past Christmases, favourite films and presents. They have a good vent about relationships and the fear of life after uni.

BWW reviewer Natalie O'Donoghue reflects on reviewing at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe and on how to improve in coming years.

Like Animals, from real life couple Kim Donohoe and Pete Lannon, is an exploration into what it is to love. It is a charming two-handler, mixing stories from their own relationship with historic experiments with animals. In particular, our attempts to teach animals how to speak.

The Afflicted, from new Scottish theatre collective Groupwork uses dance, physical theatre and multimedia to tell the story of the Hope River Girls. It is inspired by real-life events taking place in Le Roy, New York, when many girls at the same High School became suddenly afflicted with tics a?" twitching and stuttering uncontrollably without any cause. Media descended on the town as more girls became afflicted, and doctors came up with competing diagnoses. In the end, was it all just a case of mass hysteria?

Knot explores intimacy in relationships, not just romantic, through showstopping and emotional acrobatics and dance.

In a city where rising accommodation prices and cost of living push both visiting artists and locals out of its festivals, Scottee's Class could not be more pertinent, and that is exactly why it needs to be presented at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

Described as 'a multimedia clown show', beep boop is a comic examination of technology's place in our lives.   Taking aim at phone addiction, the performative nature of social media and the perils of online dating, it asks, in a world where technology has brought us closer together, why do we still feel so lonely?

Welcome to the monthly meeting of the Chicken Appreciation Society.   Over the course of the next fifty minutes, ardent poultry fans like yourself will enjoy chicken impressions, informative lectures, beauty pageants and even interpretive dance; all in celebration of our feathered friends. 

Ali Alawad had his visa application rejected two weeks before Ali and Alpo was due to premiere in Finland. Alpo Aaltokoski had to continue alone, with just a projection for company.