Edinburgh Fringe Review: Leo Still Dies In The End.

Rating: 🛟 🛟 🛟 🛟 Four lifebelts out of five!

Alice Fishbein. Gilded Baloon. Patter House – Dram. 22.00 (60 mins) Until 15th August. TICKETS HERE.

Who doesn’t remember the film Titanic, James Cameron’s 1997 epic. Alice Fishbein’s self-penned Titanic-themed parody, Leo Still Dies in the End, sails into the biggest open Arts Festival in the world like a rogue champagne cork. This is a show that knows exactly how ridiculous it is — and absolutely revels in it.

A self-professed Titanic obsessive since the age of six, Alice spends the hour poking fun at what, in retrospect, was perhaps fairly cringe-worthy dialogue and somewhat unbelievable plot twists from the 1997 epic. (There may indeed be reasons why Titanic didn’t get an Oscar nomination for best screenplay…)

Fishbein plays… well, everyone. One minute she’s Jack, the windswept dreamer sketching his “French girls” on a budget sketchpad from Poundland; the next she’s both young and old versions of Rose, a fiery socialite whose corset is held together with cable ties. In fact we are promised that she is willing to portray ALL of the 2200 passengers aboard the original sailing!

Adding a delightful streak of unpredictability, each performance is shaped by her onstage “Wheel of Fortune,” a gaudy, spinning contraption that determines key plot twists, alternate endings, and occasional absurd intrusions. Although on the night I went, it was apparently playing up. Not that it really mattered! The glorious result is that no two nights are ever the same — and the cast of characters in Fishbein’s head never get too comfortable.

Fishbein’s sheer enthusiasm, hard work, and energy carries this fast-paced show, cleverly directed by Ryan Lind. Her writing is sharp and daft in equal measure, peppered with references that leap from James Cameron’s 1997 weepie, to pop culture oddities, including a cameo from Celine Dion’s disembodied voice. Her American roots give the performance an effervescent, almost Broadway-style gloss. With the use of some hilarious props, including her 7^th grade (?) gym medal (which  doubles as the famous ‘heart of the ocean’), we are taken on a whirlwind tour of this iconic film.

It’s also commendable that she’s not afraid to slip in a sly comment about class divide, both on the ship and in our own times, without it feeling heavy-handed. If there’s a tiny niggle, some gags run just a beat too long, and the final sentimental turn, though sweet, feels almost at odds with the preceding absurdity. Having said that, I personally loved it and of course, by then, Fishbein has already won us all over!

And I speak as someone who nearly had Leo – yes, THE Leo, performing in one of my plays in a Pub in Birmingham, England until Titanic became the huge hit it became… and turned him into a suddenly unobtainable commodity!

So it was an especially emotional night for me…!

But for everyone else, Leo Still Dies in the End is like a drunken history teacher recounting the Titanic disaster while acting out every role in a one-woman panto. Bonkers, charming, and brimming with affection for its source material — even if, yes, Leo still dies in the end.

This show will go on…!