The Edinburgh Fringe Festival, spanning the first three weeks of August, is the largest performing arts festival in the world. We were fortunate enough to attend the first two weeks. Engaging with the Fringe is an incredible opportunity for anyone passionate about the performing arts. Students are able to showcase their hard work for more than our typical upper school performance schedule, and they are exposed to and become a part of a community of artistic peoples and ideas from all over the world. The festival encompasses an array of diverse forms of expression including traditional theater, comedy, musicals, dance, cabarets, circus theater, operas, and so much more.
This past August, I joined eleven of my peers at the Fringe: Rae Dodds ‘26, Bekah Givan ‘26, Kayla Gomez ‘26, Shriya Gupta ‘26, Kira Jones ‘24, Kristy Keil ‘25, Karina Layman ‘26, Isabel Pombo ‘26, Henry Roth ‘25, Sofia Sabitsana ‘24, and Mikayla Swanston ‘26
Throughout our time at the Fringe, we performed Women by Chiara Atik eight times in Lime Studio, allowing the cast time to experiment with their comedic timing and improvisations. The play presented a fast-paced, contemporary spin on the classic Little Women, which fit our cast perfectly. Watching the show develop over the course of two weeks was remarkable, and seeing how much fun the cast had working on the production made the experience all the more special and memorable.
Our show ran for 50 minutes every day at 4:10 PM, allowing us plenty of time to immerse ourselves in both the festival and the city.
The magic of the festival lies in the way art consumes the entire city. Street performers draw in large crowds, music fills the streets, churches transform into show venues, every night thousands attend the Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo–a renowned display of military performances and music at Edinburgh Castle, and every block people hand out fliers and friendship bracelets in costume. The shows we attended ranged from Kyiv City Ballet’s Tribute to Peace in Ukraine to Shamalton, an improvised musical, to Nail Polish, a story exploring the pressure and stigma faced by the queer community, to Too Much Light Makes the Baby Go Blind, a collection of 30 plays in 60 minutes. We were completely immersed in this world of art and expression.
The city itself holds its own beauty. We wandered streets older than our own country and surprises awaited us at every turn. Exploring the streets of Edinburgh led us to parks, museums, restaurants, bookstores, cafes, and shops, all transforming our walks into adventures of their own.
Our experience at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival expanded our comprehension of and engagement with the theater community and artistic spaces as a whole. Through each performance, we established our presence on the international stage, immersing ourselves in the vibrant and dynamic mosaic of creative expression that defines the Fringe.
