Brighton Fringe will this May celebrate its 20th birthday with over 4,000 performances at 140 venues.
Calling the Fringe as “whacky and weird as usual,” Fringe chair Duncan Lustig-Prean said there would be new venues – including Spiegel Gardens near the seafront and the Revel Puck Circus at the Level.
For the first time, the box office for the events will be housed at the Theatre Royal, and a popular move will be the return of a printed brochure, due out in April, but booking is already open online, while shows continue to be added to the list of events.
Launching the festival at the Ironworks Studios were some of last year’s Fringe award winners. Two particularly caught my eye.
Spuds presented Tatties On Tour – a very silly duo of Dave and Gregg, dressed as potatoes, and getting up to all sorts of crazy antics, including live teleshopping and an audience raffle – first prize a dead swan. The couple owe a lot to the absurdist drama of Beckett and Ionesco, and if their 10 minute trailer was anything to go by they’ll please the crowds with their comical mash-up (see what I did there?).
Any cinema goer will remember the advert slots by Pearl and Dean. Well Peter Pearl and wife Marsha Dean appear live on the stage of the Lavender Lounge, aboard the dubiously named cruise ship the Watery Queen. They bill themselves as the most heterosexual pair in show business but to my mind that’s fake news. There’s a lot of innuendo – quite explicit- about cruise diva Jane McDonald and bake-off judge Paul Hollywood, which I won’t repeat, and there are inappropriate gags about beards and pussies. It’s cheesy and it’s hilarious. If these two shows are typical, the Fringe will be its usual rumbustious, naughty self.
Tickets and information – brightonfringe.org and look out for my hot tips about what to see in Scene magazine soon.
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