Witches Corner -  ★★★★☆ - Defiant theSpace @ Surgeons’ Hall (Venue 53): Mon 17 – Sat 22 Aug 2026 Review by Rebecca Mahar Review commissioned by, and originally published on All Edinburgh Theatre, 21 August 2026. Edited by Thom Dibdin. Magic or misogyny? asks  Witches Corner , a new sociopolitical play from Encapsulus Productions that packs laughter, rage, song, and grief into an hour that questions how much has really changed for women since they were burned and hanged and stoned as witches. The play, written and directed by Eilidh Smith with music composed by Rona Johnston, is set in Pittenweem in Fife, a “bonnie wee toon where awbody kens awbody and awbody kens awbody’s business.” A scene from the preview performances of Witches Corner at the Scottish Storytelling Centre. Pic: Alastair Moore. Visit All Edinburgh Theatre to read the full review !

Cavalleria Rusticana -  ★★★☆☆ - Introspective Pagliacci -  ★★★☆☆ - Ambitious Stockbridge Church (Venue 317): Wed 12 – Sat 15 Aug 2026 Review by Rebecca Mahar Review commissioned by, and originally published on All Edinburgh Theatre, 20 August 2026. Edited by Thom Dibdin. Aria Alba – Opera For All brings a double bill of one-act operas to Stockbridge Church this Fringe, with the classic pairing of Mascagni’s  Cavalleria Rusticana  and Leoncavallo’s  Pagliacci  in a programme that emphasises the women in these narratives of male jealousy and coercion. Both operas are performed in Italian with two screens positioned either side of the stage displaying brief summaries of what is happening, with occasional interjections of translated dialogue. This approach unfortunately reduces the detail of what most of the audience will understand compared to traditional translation. The screens also become invisible when the full company is on stage, and the pillars of ...

CQD to SOS: A Titanic Story -  ★★★☆☆ - Haunting Greenside @ Riddles Court (Venue 16): Mon 17 – Sat 22 Aug 2026 Review by Rebecca Mahar Review commissioned by, and originally published on All Edinburgh Theatre, 20 August 2026. Edited by Thom Dibdin. Bringing the Edinburgh Rep Company’s lineup of six centuries in six shows at the Fringe into the 20th century is  CQD to SOS: A Titanic Story , a glimpse into the infamous sea disaster through the eyes of its wireless operators: two on Titanic herself and one on Carpathia, racing through the ice-filled night to render aid. Like the stokers and engineers who fought the water belowdecks and kept Titanic’s power on until the last possible minute, wireless operators Harold Bride and Jack Phillips are figures in the history of the sinking that have attracted more attention and interest in recent years. S tephen McParland as Phillips and Daniel Drever as Bride. Pic: Edinburgh Rep. Visit All Edinburgh Theatre to read the full review !...

Jekyll and Hyde –  ★★★½  – Sharp   Muchmuchmore Theatre 17-22 Aug Review by Rebecca Mahar   Muchmuchmore Theatre, the in-house theatre company of Runshaw College, returns to the Fringe with another adaptation of classic literature in the form of  Jekyll and Hyde , a re-imagining of Robert Louis Stevenson that relocates the dichotomies of human nature into a sociocritical lens connecting past and present.   A scene from Jekyll and Hyde. Pic: Muchmuchmore Theatre. The show jumps between nineteenth century London, where the widowed Harriet Jekyll is beginning to pick up the threads of her husband’s research a year after her death, and the present day where Florence Monroe is being questioned by police about a possible connection between her tumblr blog and a murder investigation. However, it’s not as simple as two parallel stories existing at different point in time: the boundaries between these worlds are cracked, with Florence observing the past, and charact...

The Witches of Macbeth –  ★★★½  – Intriguing Inanna’s Children 14-22 Aug Review by Rebecca Mahar   Interleaving ancient Sumerian myth and pagan ritual with the story of Shakespeare’s  Macbeth,  Innana’s Children’s  The Witches of Macbeth  brings a novel approach to an old story. Inanna refers to a Sumerian goddess (also called Ishtar) and the epic poem  Descent of Inanna into the Underworld , wherein Inanna seeks to overpower its ruler, her sister Erishkigal. Passing through seven gates on her descent, Inanna must remove  a piece of her regalia each time, ultimately resulting in the loss of her life— though that’s not the end of her story.  The Witches of Macbeth  parallels this katabasis-like tale with the story of Macbeth and his descent into hubristic doom, with three witches narrating both Inanna’s journey and embodying every character in Macbeth’s but the Thane himself. Eve Kagan, Maurice Parent, and Spencer Evett as the w...

Macbeth: Blood and Bluegrass –  ★★★★½  – Innovative The Barden Party 7-29 Aug Review by Rebecca Mahar   Returning from Aotearoa New Zealand after a triumphant 2025 EdFringe run, The Barden Party’s  Macbeth: Blood and Bluegrass  blazes through an adaptation of Shakespeare’s  Macbeth  that blends music, modernity, and command of the original text into a gripping new approach to an old story. Laura Irish as Macbeth. Pic: Steffen Taylor. After the speedy recitation of a te reo Māori prayer, the company launches straight into the action. Queen Duncan receives Sergeant Macduff who tells of Macbeth’s victory on the battlefield —“brave Macbeth, well she deserves that name”— followed quickly by the arrival of the lizardlike weird brothers in denim vests, and the genderslipperiness of the show is as firmly established as the story.    The show is not completely gender-swapped, with some roles such as Banquo retaining their traditional presentations, no...

The Tale of the Original Jekyll and Hyde (Told by a Mad Hatter from Stockport) –  ★★☆☆☆  – Confused Tall History Tales 7-29 Aug Review by Rebecca Mahar   “Welcome to the Bull’s Head Stockport, folks– not a place for the faint hearted, or for bulls, for that matter.”  So opens  The Tale of the Original Jekyll and Hyde (Told by a Mad Hatter from Stockport) , introducing its narrator Stanley, the hapless “everyman” character of writer and performer Andy Dickinson, and the mad hatter in question. A one-time partner in crime to Edinburgh’s notorious Deacon Brodie, Stanley sets out to tell Brodie’s story, and how this real-life man of two lives inspired Robert Louis Stevenson’s dichotomous Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Promotional image for The Original Tale: Tall History Tales   The premise is intriguing, promising a new perspective on the life and crimes of Deacon Brodie and his posthumous connection to another of Edinburgh’s famous sons. Unfortunately, this connect...

Rebecca Mahar talks to the great monodramatist. Feature commissioned by, and originally published on All Edinburgh Theatre, 18 August 2026. Edited by Thom Dibdin. Each year Edinburgh welcomes thousands of performers from across the world to the Fringe, from those just starting out to those with storied careers, and everyone in between. For the last third a century Edinburgh has, every Fringe, welcomed one performer who, over that time, has made a name for himself around the world as a celebrated – legendary even – monodrama performer. To say that Pip Utton, has done all the biggies, from Hitler to Thatcher, Francis Bacon to William Shakespeare, from Lear to a Christmas Carol, is to undervalue the nature of his performance. Utton has been those people, in a series of monodramas that allow him inhabit them like a chameleon on a leaf. Pip Utton in Bacon. Pic supplied. Visit All Edinburgh Theatre to read the full feature !

Shakespeare's Dead Dames -  ★★★☆☆ - Conflicted theSpace @ Niddry St (Venue 9): Wed 13 – Sat 15 Aug 2026 Review by Rebecca Mahar Review commissioned by, and originally published on All Edinburgh Theatre, 17 August 2026. Edited by Thom Dibdin. Aberdeen’s Academy of Expressive Arts brings a company of Senior and HNC students to the Fringe in “their first production that’s not a musical”:  Shakespeare’s Dead Dames , directed by AEA founder and Principal, Shanna Logan. An exploration of what might have happened to some of his most famous women after Shakespeare killed them off, Dead Dames takes place in a purgatorial afterlife moderated by the Director, who keeps tabs on the women and lets them know when it’s their turn to live again – that is, when their respective plays are being revived. The cast and crew of Shakespeare's Dead Dames. Pic: Academy of Expressive Arts. Visit All Edinburgh Theatre to read the full review !

Elsa McTaggart: Capturing the Light –  ★★★★☆  – Peaceful sruth-mara in association with An Lanntair 7-28 Aug Review by Rebecca Mahar   Blending music, visual art, and storytelling,  Elsa McTaggart: Capturing the Light  is a reflective time-out from the hustle and bustle of the Fringe, welcoming audiences into a space of history, family, and light. Promotional image. Pic: Ralph Tonge.   McTaggart, a multi-instrumental Scottish singer-songwriter with crofting roots, weaves her music through the story of her great-grandfather, the painter William McTaggert, another crofters’ child drawn to the arts. Though William had a thriving trade in portraiture, it was his obsession with the sea that drove him, and drew such comparisons as “what Constable did for landscape and Millet for peasant peoples, McTaggart is doing for the sea.”   Despite the short running time, McTaggart tells her story with unhurried cadence, from 1847 in Campbelltown where William was born...