The Edinburgh Minute ⏰: Weekend edition 4-6 August 2023
Locals and celebs rally for comedian after just one person shows up to her show + police at drag show, festivals escape map, all-day Arthur’s Seat run and the weekend’s best fest and non-fest events
☀️ Good morning Edinburgh. The weekend guide is below for paying subscribers. Meantime here’s Friday’s Edinburgh Minute.
🦊 Heaps of local festival news to come, but first, imagine you opened your bathroom door to find tiny fox cub curled up in the bath. That’s what happened at a house in Murrayfield. - BBC Scotland News.
🪧 Police were called in to guard a drag queen show at The Roxy after protestors showed up. As Pink News points out: “Anti-drag bigots claimed more than 300 people were going to turn up to protest Drag Queen Story Hour at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival – a number that appeared woefully over-promised when just eight people turned up.” Performer Aida H Dee said:
“My community – the LGBTQ community – we came out to show Edinburgh that we will not back down to fascism.”
💓 Locals, celebrities and the Fringe community rallied to show support for an actor after she posted online to say only one person had attended her show. Actor and writer Georgie Grier said: “There was one person in my audience today when I performed my one woman play, ‘Sunsets’ at #edfringe. It’s fine, isn’t it? It’s fine…?”
⮑ Among those offering Georgie messages and videos of support were comedians Jason Manford and Dara O Briain.
🎭 While the Fringe attracts acts from all over the world, Edinburgh is well represented on stages too. Thom Dibdin has gone to tremendous effort to log, categorise and contextualise all the locally-run shows in this Twitter thread. And if Twitter’s not your thing, Thom’s posted them to All Edinburgh Theatre too. He said:
“At Æ, our commitment is to theatre and musicals made in Edinburgh across the board, from amateurs, youth grassroots, student and professional companies. I have also collated and published a list of 85 theatre productions at the Fringe that are created, performed or produced by Edinburgh’s theatre professionals on behalf of EPAD, Edinburgh Performing Arts Development - a skills and resource-sharing project that supports Edinburgh’s independent performing artists to thrive throughout the year.”
🎤 Thanks too to Leith Comedy Festival’s Rosalind Romer who kindly got in touch with an update. That festival is in October but meantime Rosalind has some Fringe shows featuring: ‘the best visiting comedians on the Fringe. It's at the Biscuit Factory at 5pm and 8pm. The 8pm is sold out. Details are here. All profits go back into Leith Comedy Festival and the Leith Community so any help spreading the word is much appreciated!’
🗺 If you need to escape the festivals at any point, this map made by Paul Burns could help:
🏃♂️ Local runner Danny Allan is gearing up to cover 131km on Saturday for charity. His plan is to run laps of Arthur’s Seat every hour between 8.30am and 4.30pm. He is inviting others to join him on as many laps as they fancy. It’s all to raise money for the Anthony Nolan Trust. Danny writes: “The final 31 km is called Charlie’s Loop named after Danny’s friend Charlie, a funny, wildly intelligent and kind soul taken too soon. Charlie would be 31 this year and every year onwards the run will age as he should have - It will be his legacy.”
🏃 For those who prefer a Sunday morning run, the good folks of Reekie Runners invite you to join the ‘plod squad’ in the Meadows, setting off from the compass at 9am.
🧘♀️ If the thought of Mondays doesn’t fill you with joy, here’s an alternative. Thanks to Alix Picken for sharing this:
“Habits is a creative community for like-minded entrepreneurs to come together attend our events and build a network. We host both business and well-being events, talks, and workshops, while collaborating with local businesses. Our next well-being event, Monday Rest will be hosted on Monday 21st August, at Portobello Beach. Dee McQueen will guide you through some self-empowerment & intention-setting meditation and journaling, a short Yoga-inspired wiggle, followed by an optional dip in the sea. After this, we will gather indoors at a local cafe for a drink of your choice, warm up and connect with others. If this sounds like the perfect start to your week then you can grab a ticket on the link here.”
📻 Forth 1 has reported ‘record listener numbers’. - North Edinburgh News.
🚲 Holyrood Park is closed to motor traffic for much of this weekend as it hosts the UCI Cycling World Championship. The Men Elite Road Race is on Sunday, August 6 with cyclists taking off from the Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh. - More details and timings in The National.