Edinburgh Fringe. Day One

Edinburgh Fringe, 2025. Mini Blog, Day One.

Although it’s officially day one of the Fringe, I actually arrived four days ago ago, so it’s not really for me.

It’s a fact that more shows have opened in this little corner of the world than any other city in the world, although it still feels a little bit quiet.

I’ve now done the second of our new Edinburgh (not London) Literary Pub Crawl and again I’m struck by how lovely it is meeting the people who come on The Crawl. They like literature and they like a drink. What’s not to like about that!

My digs are proving a bit difficult. I’m sharing a purpose built student accommodation block with 10 other people, all who have very noisy closing doors. (I do too, but over the years I’ve got used to closing them, rather than letting the door springs do their work! The door to the communal kitchen has a sensor on it and if it’s open for more than 60 seconds it sets off an alarm. Fire prevention gone mad! (Although I guess I’d be grateful for if something really did go wrong.)

I’ve got my press pass and Industry passes today as well. At the moment I’m just concentrating on getting our show done but I’m very very keen to share the work of other artists in Edinburgh.

I actually went to the Assembly Club Bar, which is pass access only – so becomes like a private members club – after a certain time. It’s where I’ve been going during my contemporary years of the Edinburgh Fringe and where most of the people I know hang out and where I met them.

Tonight is a bit quiet, but I did bump into the brilliant David Calvitto – an actor who has a show up here which I’ll tell you more about later – and Paul Levy, the brilliant man who set up Fringe Review website – he’s from Brighton. And the two of us ended up going to Tesco’s to buy some supplies and although I’ve not met any of my other 10 flatmates, I’m going to take the plunge and put some frozen stuff in the fridge. Them’s the brakes aren’t they. So glamorous! Rock ’n’ roll.