My Last full day in Edinburgh.

(Photo of Rawiri Panatene, star of The Whale Rider, and Noel Olken at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2005)

For those of you who don’t like long detailed entries, on my last day in Edinburgh I saw five shows, walked a lot, and stayed out late drinking. End of story. Don’t read any further.

Read on if you want all the details…
I had a plan for my last full day at the festival; to see as many shows in as many venues as possible. But first, I had to deal with Fed Ex and shipping the boxes of props back to Chicago. With that out of the way, I stayed at the Roxy and saw a solo dance piece presented by the Mexican company that brought the movement piece I liked so much.
I’m not a big dance fan, so of course it was hard to keep my eyes open, even though she was making so much noise. All I could think about were all the other shows going on at the same time at the Roxy who were hearing someone stomp on their lines. Flamenco is loud shit, man. I’m glad we weren’t booked at the same time. Something to be thankful for!

After the show, I went to check email downstairs in the café. Many venues have free
wi-fi as an incentive to come in. It works.

That done, I went back to High Street, wandered around awhile, went to get a Fringe catalog and find a show for the afternoon. Ducking into a falafel shop to get out of the rain, I spoke to Kris who called to say hi. It was so nice to hear her voice. I missed her, and I knew I wanted to go home, but I was already missing this fantasy world I was in.

I went to the Gilded Balloon, a long established venue and saw a funny show about a guy who fucked with the people who sent him one of those Nigerian spam letters. For 11 months he lead them into thinking he was a rich rube. The show was basically an edited transcript of his email correspondence over 11 months. Simple, funny, smart.

Then I had dinner at Black Bo’s, a vegetarian restaurant. Food good, service not so good.
What is it with service in Scotland? It sucks!

Then off to the Underbelly for The Bicycle Men show from LA. I missed it when it played in Chicago. It was good, it was funny, it was well performed, glad I got to see it.

Then back to the Gilded Balloon to see a German comic I met on the street do his set with two other comics, one English, one Canadian. It was weird, mildly funny, but not very good. Trying too hard to be shocking and they never really achieved any kind of connection with the audience. A couple of good hecklers, though, that kept them on their toes.

Then I went back to the Roxy to see the cabaret show. Linda, the house manager had been inviting me since we first arrived. The show consists of a woman who interprets Brecht and Weill songs with a quartet backing her up. Good, okay. I like Brecht and Weill.

Then back to the Zoo to say goodbye to my friends from New Zealand whose show, Cracks In The Garden I really liked.

A friend of theirs, a New Zealand actor had come to see the show and we all hung out afterwards at the Spiegel tent. Their friend was Rawiri Panatene, the grandfather in The Whale Rider, one of my favorite movies. I love that film. It was so nice to meet him, and what a great guy. There is a picture of us at the top of this post. We got to hang out until they kicked us out of there.

Well, it was a long day, but since I knew I was going home in a few hours, I didn’t care how late I was out.

It was a long day Tuesday traveling home on crowded planes with cold cheese sandwiches and a thick girl in the seat next to me who didn’t know how to keep her elbows out of my airspace. Where’s homeland security when you need them?

Next up, a recap and wrap up of the trip to Edinburgh 2005.