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Humans of the Fringe, Edinburgh (2026)

24/08/2025

“I’ve been coming to the Fringe for over a decade now, and producing my own work since 2023. Technically I’m based in London, I am Habesha (Eritrea/Ethiopia) and I am a performance artist/entrepreneur at the intersection of Theatre, Music and Tech.

This year, I am presenting two ‘episodes’ of my Afrofuturist anthology theatre series: I AM. You can catch an ‘episode’ a day, as they are presented on consecutive days, we call it binge-worthy theatre. It is modular so there isn’t an order in which you should watch them. If you like one, come back and catch the other one the next day, same time, same venue.

Alongside presenting my work, I created a book: Edinburgh Fringe With Spice (the 2025 Edition). Yes, I know, it’s not like I’m not busy enough with performing or anything. However, with almost 4000 shows at this fringe but fewer than 300 shows that centre artists of colour (as documented by Fringe of Colour database, created by Jessica Brough), I noticed that it was hard for audiences to find us with ease. So, I decided to create a pocket size book showcasing all those shows. We’re encouraging everyone to add a bit of seasoning to their Fringe experience.

This year was the pilot, made possible with the support of The City of Edinburgh Council, Culture and Wellbeing Service, Diversity and Inclusion Fund. Next year you will be able to pre-order your copy. It is a collectors item, ‘we’re not asking to fit in, we came to stand out’ and stand out we shall - its history in the making!

Edinburgh, Edinburgh, Edinburgh, thank you! My landlord and her family in Edinburgh are the kindest people I’ve ever met. They’ve pretty much adopted me as their grandchild. They haven’t been able to come to the festival and engage with it like they did last year. So, after the festival I look forward to doing a personalised performance in their house for them and their friends.”
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Lula Mebrahtu - LULA.XYZ

24/07/2025

“One of my big highlights from over the years was going to Australia and finding Tim Minchin. He was relatively unknown then, and he came to Edinburgh and won Best Newcomer in the Edinburgh Comedy Awards. He’s just become phenomenal.

I am the Artistic Director of Gilded Balloon. I do this with my gorgeous daughter Katy, who is my Co-Artistic Director. I’m from Edinburgh; I was born and brought up here with Norwegian parents.

She came into the business about ten years ago. We are very much a family business, and we live and work in Edinburgh. My grandson, my brother, and son work with us. Gilded Balloon is 40 years old this year. I started it, so it’s my baby.

I actually started it in the Cowgate. There was a restaurant there called Gilded Balloon; they said, ‘Would you like to do some shows at the festival?’ and it grew from there. It grew from a studio of 150 seats up to 20 odd venues. This year, we’re up to 200 shows a day. It’s so commercial now, and there’s so much competition, you’ve got to keep on top of it.

I started a show called Late’n’Live. It would start at one in the morning and finish at five. All the comics after doing their gigs elsewhere would all come down to the Cowgate and watch each other on stage or just have a good time. It was a great camaraderie in those days. The 90s was the time the whole comedy industry grew. In those days, there was only a handful of women; I’m glad to say there are lots of wonderful women performing now.

I also started a competition called So You Think You Are Funny. That has grown hugely as well. Just about every brilliant comic has come through it, and many of them are now household names.

For our 40th anniversary, we’ve got so many people coming back. I’m just glad we’ve got a good reputation, and people believe we put on good things.”
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Karen Koren -

20/08/2024

“I’m from Edinburgh, I’ve lived here all my life. When the Fringe is on, I like meeting all the different people that come here for it. People are always stopping to ask for pictures of me.

I’m here up at the Royal Mile most days of the year. I meet up with my pals and performers from all over the place. I’ve known them all for years now. I’ve seen people’s shows that much, I could probably put their show on for them.”
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Jimmy Crombie

Edinburgh Festival Fringe

19/08/2024

“I’m from the South of France, I moved here about ten years ago. My background is theatre, illustration, childcare and writing. I published a book called Singing Willows back in December then started performing in small libraries in Edinburgh.

Singing Willows is all about nature and wildlife so I get a lot of inspiration in the Botanical Gardens and visit it a lot. It’s my favourite place in Edinburgh.

The idea started during lockdown. I had the idea to combine all of my passions together into one project that would include performances and children’s literature. First, I started making the book then I found musicians. Together we composed twenty bilingual songs. The whole project is bilingual, it’s French - English.

The Fringe was coming around and I was like am I ready for this, I might as well try it. I put together a show that’s based on the book and we’re all dressed as the characters. It’s all interactive, children can join us at any point and behind us we have screens from the book so people can sing along and see illustrations from the book. We do ten songs in English and the same ten songs in French.

I had a few events with the French Institute before, so I applied at Viva le Fringe and was lucky to be selected. It’s my first time performing at the Fringe but I’ve seen many shows over the ten years.“
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Alexandra Borghino

“Singing Willows”
Time: 15:00
Dates: 19th-26th August (except 20th/21st)
Location: French Institute In Scotland (venue 168)

Edinburgh Festival Fringe

18/08/2024

“I won a comedy competition at my university when I went to law school, I won five hundred bucks. I had no other job at the time so I said to the guy that ran the comedy stuff, how can I get more of this, and it went from there.

I’m from Australia but now I say I’m from America because I’ve lived there for the past four or five years. I also got my Croatian citizenship a few years ago.

I’m doing my second show at the Fringe, along with as many other gigs as I can. My show this year is called Going Down Swinging. I named it that after a review I got last year from The Scotsman, where they said this is basically a white guy going down swinging with his opinions. The shows have been going great I must say.

I’ve been here at the Fringe about four or five times but I’ve only done shows twice. I used to just pass through and look at my friends looking so beaten down and depressed so I just thought I’d never do it. I never saw the point to be honest so I just did the spot shows. I seemed to lose a lot of money so I snapped and thought, if I want to be an international comedian, this is something you’ve got to do. It’s a great skills building exercise. It slaps you around and humbles you.“
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Amos Gill

“Going Down Swinging”
Time: 19:45
Dates: 18th-26th August
Location: Underbelly - Bristo Square (venue 302)

Edinburgh Festival Fringe

17/08/2024

“I’ve been coming up here for the last ten years or so on and off. I’m originally from Norwich but I now live in London. The Fringe is such a great place to see loads of shows at once and get lots of inspiration. I’m really enjoying just taking a punt on different shows.

I’m a storyteller and theatre maker. I am up here with my theatre company The Suitcase Storytelling Company. We have a show for two-to six-year olds and their families called Grow.

Last year, my colleague Niall brought it up just as a one-person, smaller scale show. This year, we got funding to turn it into a two hander and bring it into the bigger space of the Scottish Storytelling Centre.

It’s been going really well, we’ve had some great crowds. It’s a very interactive show so it’s really fun to see how the audiences’ different personalities change how the show is.

After the Fringe, we’ll be working on our next show which I think will be for slightly older kids. I also make shows for adults as well so my next thing is I want to do a retelling of Pandora’s Box.”
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Minnie Wilkinson

“Grow”
Time: 10:30
Dates: 17th-25th August (except 19th/21st)
Location: Scottish Storytelling Centre (venue 30)

Edinburgh Festival Fringe

16/08/2024

“I’ve been acting since I was around thirteen. My first major network role was on Skins on Channel 4 with my twin sister. After that, I had a hard time getting my acting career back to the heights of what it was in my teenage years.

I started writing more and started doing theatre. I realised that writing and directing I not only liked more, but I think I was better at. I’m now a writer performer. I’m doing my show in Edinburgh for the first time this year.

The show is called Really Good Exposure. You can expect the unexpected. It’s a bit of a look into how we treat s*x workers and how we treat child stars, with some of the parallels that I’ve noticed. Along with the hypothesis within that.

I’d really like it to come to London after this. We did two previews in London and it sold out really quickly. Ideally, I’d love to eventually develop it for television because obviously it’s set a lot in the TV world so in my mind it works really well as a scripted TV show.

Last year, I came to the Fringe and did it properly as a punter. I think we saw like four or five shows a day for a week. It was a lot but I was like right ok, this is how the Fringe works, this is how people market shows, this has given me ideas, now I’m going to go off and do it. If I was to give someone advice on putting on a show here, I would definitely say come up and see how it works first.”
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Megan Prescott

“Really Good Exposure”
Time: 17:20
Dates: 16th-25th August (except 20th)
Location: Underbelly, Cowgate (venue 61)

15/08/2024

“There’s so much to see here at the Fringe, I cannot believe it. It makes me proud of other artists who are just hustling and showing their work.

I’m based in London. I’m an actor and a singer. I’m up here with the show called The Smeds and The Smoos by Tall Stories. I’m playing a couple of characters in the show, they have been going really, really good.

I feel this is a normal experience of Edinburgh Fringe but I know it’s not. The show has been quite popular, we’ve been filling out the Grand at the Pleasance which has been amazing. We’ve been so lucky.

I’ve been doing this since I was a kid. This is what I do full-time now. I schooled abroad and started it over there. I then came here and went to school in Bristol, then went to uni. I tried to do it on the side while I was studying but it was quite tough so when I finished, I worked for a couple of years then got back into it.

Tall Stories is such a good company to have experienced this with. Also, Something For The Weekend, they’ve been looking after us and we’ve been supporting their other shows . It’s been great. I would love to come back next year.”
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Lola May

“The Smeds and The Smoos”
Time: 13:15
Dates: 15th-18th August
Location: Pleasance Courtyard (venue 33)

Edinburgh Festival Fringe

14/08/2024

“My first experience of the Fringe was back in 2019 with my wife and four kids. We came by accident, we didn’t know what this was and I had the time of my life. I love live magic, circus, music and art, it was just magical.

I’ve been to about forty nations and this is the most beautiful city in the world in my perspective. Just being on the Royal Mile seeing all of the live street performances is a lot of fun.

I’m from Colorado in the United States. I’m here with the Gilded Balloon performing Baby Shark and Tails of the Seven Seas. The shows have been going great. We’ve been selling out lots and I couldn’t be happier.

Last year, my wife and I were finally getting back in to the arts scene again. We got into the childcare business, early childhood education. We wrote a lot of books based on the folk music of different countries. We discovered the Baby Shark character was in the public domain and thought how fun would that be, to have a Baby Shark show that featured the characters and songs from our books. We created an original story that has baby shark interacting with our character, Fiddlefox.

Our first show was on the 31st July and we’re here until the 17th then we fly to Edmonton Fringe to do the same show there.”
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Chris Vuk

“Baby Shark and the Tails of the Seven Seas”
Time: 10:20
Dates: 14th-17th August
Location: Gilded Balloon Patter House (venue 24)

Edinburgh Festival Fringe

13/08/2024

“The really weird thing about the Fringe is you see so much stuff that makes you so inspired, then an hour later you go and do your show and it’s still rubbish.

I’m from Scarborough but I live in London. I did my first gig about six years or so ago. I’ve been slowly building up from there, I’m a comedian. I can’t remember not being fascinated by comedy. I did theatre first, and acted but this was always inevitable. I just knew that this was the thing for me.

I did my first hour last year. I’ve always been coming up here either as a punter or doing split bill Free Fringe shows. Me and my friend Dan did a show where we didn’t have power for the first week, I think it was a sewage leak. I’ve been in the worst rooms in the city time and time again.

I’m doing a show called If I Told You I’d Have to Kiss You. It’s kind of about love and cars. You know that teenage love you have, where you’re desperate for love but you can’t get it. For me the car was like a symbol of expectation and hope, the world opening out in front of me, but it didn’t lead to that.”
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Paddy Young

“If I Told You I’d Have to Kiss You”
Time:19:50
Dates: 13th-23rd August (except 14th)
Location: Monkey Barrel Comedy (venue 515)

12/08/2024

“Edinburgh is just so beautiful, there’s so much history here. It’s also amazing you can see a building that’s hundreds of years old right next to or above a Sainsbury’s.

I’m originally from Kentucky but I live in New York City now. This is my first time at the Fringe. We did a five-show-run before we came over. Most of it sold out so we wanted to see what the Fringe audience in Edinburgh would think of it.

My show is called Something to Believe In. It’s about q***rness and Catholicism. Seventeen-year-old me running around an all girls Catholic school figuring out I’m q***r. Trying to take down religion and the government as well.

I’ve been doing theatre since I was about seven years old and I’ve been doing it professionally for about a decade. It’s always been a thing I’ve done. It’s always been a passion of mine. When I was in college I took a solo show class. I wrote a twenty-minute solo show about my dad. That was what got me into the art of writing and performing solo shows.”
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Sarah Alice Shull

“Something To Believe In”
Time: 22:35
Dates: 12th-17th August
Time: 22:15
Dates: 19th-24th August
Location: theSpace on the Mile (venue 39)

Edinburgh Festival Fringe

11/08/2024

“This is my second year at the Fringe. I’m from New York City but I’m originally from the Philippines. I’m a performer and I’m also a programme manager for the dance education and family programmes at The Joyce Theatre in New York City.

My first love is dance. I grew up competing in dance since I was a child then it expanded to music, I have a music degree. When I moved to New York in 2007 I got the acting bug so I started attending acting classes. I’ve been teaching artists for more than twenty years.

I’m here at the Fringe to produce two shows. I have one AI immersive show called AI: The Waiting Room - An Immersive Experience. Natalia Yandyganova is the director for that show. My second show is called , The Early Morning Cabaret Comedy Show. I’m going to do everything in that one. I’m going to do one woman shows with different guests but I’ll mostly play the piano and dance. Sabrina Morabito will be the co director for that show.

One hiccup we’ve had was there was no Wi-Fi at our venue for one of our AI immersive shows. We had to use our personal hotspots so that was very challenging.“
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Joyce Lao

“AI: The Waiting Room - An Immersive Experience”
Time: 15:30/16:30/17:30
Dates: 11th-25th August (except 12th & 19th)
Location: C Arts - C venues - C alto (venue 40)

“ The Early Morning Cabaret Comedy Show”
Time: 09:45
Dates: 13th-17th August
Location: theSpace @ Symposium Hall (venue 43)

Edinburgh Festival Fringe

Humans of the Fringe

24/08/2025

24/07/2025

20/08/2024

19/08/2024

18/08/2024

17/08/2024

16/08/2024

15/08/2024

14/08/2024

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