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A record num­ber of shows will be staged at this year’s Edin­burgh Fest­ival Fringe, brush­ing off fears that the clash with the Lon­don Olympics would harm the Fest­ival. A 6% increase on last year’s pro­gramme will see 2,695 shows take to theatres, pubs, nooks, cran­nies and gar­dens all over Scotland’s cap­ital in August with 47 coun­tries represented .

Kath Main­land, Chief Exec­ut­ive of the Edin­burgh Fest­ival Fringe Soci­ety said:

This is the Year of Cre­at­ive Scot­land and it is the year in which the world’s greatest sport­ing event, the Olympic and Para­lympic Games, hap­pens in Lon­don while the world’s greatest cul­tural event takes place in Edin­burgh. The Edin­burgh Fest­ival Fringe is still the first choice for per­formers, pro­du­cers, artists and cre­at­ors to come and tell their story; we are proud that the Fringe is still the place to bring your work, with oppor­tun­it­ies to amaze, enthral and excite audi­ences from both far away and close to home. We have a pro­gramme that will cap­ture the atten­tion of people all over the world and demon­strate why over the last sixty six years the Fringe has grown into the greatest show on earth.

It is also Jubilee year and the 60^th anniversary of  The Queen’s reign is marked with La Clique Roy­ale — The Queen’s Selec­tion, Maurice’s Jubilee sees Julian Glover and Sheila Reid in a brand new play by Nich­ola McAul­iffe, and Tea With The Old Queen tells the true story of the Queen Mother’s but­ler ‘Back­stairs Billy’.

There’s the usual mix of polit­ics and com­edy: Tony Benn: Will and Test­a­ment at the Assembly Rooms will see the former Min­is­ter shar­ing some of his life exper­i­ence (no com­edy here), while Alan Dav­ies — Life is Pain; Paul Merton’s Impro Chums with guests Mike McShane, Lee Simpson, Richard Vranch and Suki Web­ster, and Sandi Toks­vig Live: My Valentine will try and get ‘em rolling in the aisles.

Well-known names include Les Den­nis in Jigsy, the story of a comedian with over 30 years in the busi­ness, and Willy Russell’s Edu­cat­ing Rita has a new out­ing star­ring Mat­thew Kelly and Claire Sweeney.

The Olympic’s may be down south, but they’re not for­got­ten: Chariot: The Eric Lid­dell Story tells the story of one of Scotland’s greatest Olympic ath­letes, and Al Mur­ray the Pub Land­lord: The Guv’s Olympic Pub Quiz hopes to be the ulti­mate Olympic Pub Quiz.

There’s a vast selec­tion for kids with Elmo, Cookie Mon­ster and Big Bird in Ses­ame Street Live – Elmo Makes Music and Fringe favour­ite The Enorm­ous Turnip is back for a tenth year.

A num­ber of plays have a woman, best known for being behind the male lead, com­ing to the fore to tell her own tale: I Shall Be Remembered — The Story of Madame de Pom­pa­dour, Lady M from the Scot­tish play and Miss Havisham’s Expect­a­tions are some. Miriam Mar­golyes — Dick­ens’ Women sees the act­ress explore 23 of Dick­ens’ female characters.

Shakespeare is, as always, at the n°1 slot with more than 45 pro­duc­tions that involve him in some way: The Merry Wives of Osaka moves the drama to Japan, Macbeth in Scots is exactly what it says, and Macbeth Unsexed! has an all female cast. Fringe First win­ners in 1995, Poland’s Teatr Biuro Podrozy, will per­form Macbeth: Who Is That Blood­ied Man.

Music is every­where, from Mike Oldfield’s Tubu­lar Bells For Two, which is a two man inter­pret­a­tion of the 1973 clas­sic, to The National Youth Orches­tra of Iraq mak­ing their Edin­burgh début.  The orches­tra, formed in 2009, together a mix­ture of self-taught Kur­d­ish, Arab, Turk­men and Assyr­ian 16–29 year old musi­cians.  For the con­cert, the orches­tra will be joined by Julian Lloyd Webber and the Edin­burgh Youth Orchestra.

The Fringe pro­gramme comes in at 376 pages, weighs 605 grams!

Photo: Edu­cat­ing Rita,Matthew Kelly and Claire Sweeney

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