Top 10 Things to see at the Edinburgh Fringe

At this year's Edinburgh fringe I saw 35 shows, around 1% of the total on offer but here are my top recommendations. There were a couple of notable shows that did not quite make the top 10 recommendations: “Keith Moon: the real me” for Who fans, “Now that is what I call Brexit” for musical satire fans and “Paris de Nuit” for circus fans but here are my favourites ten.

The Dots ★★★★★

The Dots are a sophisticated singing trio, elegantly dressed, stylishly choreographed and word perfect ..at least they were until the soprano stormed out and the mezzo died. The remaining Dot Helen played by Helen Colby decides to carry on with under rehearsed understudies, Macey Cherett who wants to incorporate magic and Nerine Skinner an enthusiastic amateur. The joy of this show is that they each totally inhabit these comic creations.

Knock Knock ★★★★★

It is devised and performed by the Founders of Hot Coals Theatre, Clare-Louise English and Jo Sargeant who work so well together. You hardly notice that there are no words as they use movement and facial expressions synchronised with the beautiful underscore to tell their story. With their comical noses and Harris's sumptuous beard, so much of the emotion is expressed through their eyes and they exploit this wonderfully, never rushing the moment and always aware of the audience watching them. 

EDINBURGH FRINGE REVIEW: A Rock'n'Roll Suicide! at the Zoo Southside

Edinburgh Fringe is full of a wide range of shows and performers of vastly different experience and talents all of them hoping to make that break through into fame and success from their Fringe performances. With 3500 shows it is a competitive world and many will have stories of what might have been. One artist, Lee Mark Jones has put his whole life story on stage in a incredibly raw autobiographical performance at the Zoo venue. He calls it a Rock and Roll suicide and in the course of a powerfully honest 50 minutes we begin to see why.

It is of course a tribute to his music hero, David Bowie, especially in his Ziggy Stardust incarnation and the tone is set when he enters the stage to "There is a star man" although he undermines himself immediately by apologising for the mistakes that will follow. We learn that this Kidderminster lad made his stage debut in a hail of spit and bottles in 1976 as part of the punk era but was deeply hurt by the death of his younger sister shortly afterwards. Tragedy and musical fresh starts seem to be the story of his life.