front of house
PUBLICITY SHOT OF THE WEEK
PURELY FOR YOUR own amusement, we give you this fine specimen of a publicity shot. Obviously, the subject is Emperor Ming The Merciless who, the Fringe brochure informs
us, is offering to take audiences on a trip to, wait for it, Uranus. Judging by the
expression on poor Ming’s face it looks as though his own tradesman's has just received an alien delivery. Us, cheap gag? Never.
Tripterranus (Fringe) Comedy Cafe Roadshow, Truck in Charles Street (Venue 74) 0470
456669, 74—30 Aug (not Sun) 2pm, 4pm & 6pm, £7.
i\. -J’
Shit
’Imagine being condemned
, to an existence spent = literally in shit: shovelling
it, eating and drinking it, sleeping in it.’ Thus begins the press release for Kevin Williams’s play The Pigsty which is being performed at C Venue. Sounds like every day at the office to us but the biggest problem facing Philip Saunders, Pigsty’s stage manager, was a severe shortage of shit — or rather a lack of any decent fake faeces. Saunders needed something which looked like the real thing but wasn't. It had to be pliable but odourless, edible but waterproof, and not attract flies.
A tall order for a turd, one would have thought but, undaunted, Saunders scoured high and low for the perfect pog. After much searching, Saunders
managed to turn up a substance called Vermiculite. It is conventionally used in the horticultural industry to improve the chemical properties of potting compost. The actors are now reported to be as happy as pigs in Vermiculite.
Naked Nipples
Nancy Hartman (below) has been promising to play the banjo on stage buck-naked in the unlikely event of her show, Smart Women, Stupid Choices, bombing during the first week. Ms
Hartman's show at the Famous Grouse House
No! Not the clamps
seems to be concerned with what looks like an unusual form of therapy. One sus— pects that her stage patient, that's him with the nipple clamps, is praying for poor sales and a swift retirement.
Stop Press
The Gilded Balloon II has been refused a late licence due to complaints from residents about noise. All the affected shows have been moved to new venues.
' 'This has been a very
difficult situation for the Gilded Balloon,’ said Karen Koren, Gilded Balloon’s artistic director. ’However, we hope to reach a com- promise. Three shows have had to be moved and every effort has been made by the Gilded Balloon to accommodate all parties concerned. We hope the public will understand.’ Shows at the Gilded Balloon itself are unaffected.
The school of
hard Knox
Let's hear it for Councillor Moira Knox. Wherever there’s scandal,
the moral conscience of the Morningside ladies is there,
honing her bon mots of outrage. This year she’s threatening a vow of silence, so by way of tribute, The List offers up some of her choicest cuts of the last few years.
Moira, we salute you.
'A dirty minded disgrace.’ Roared Moira on the Australian, lesbian, trapeze act Club Swrng.
‘Edinburgh's a worldwide tourist attraction with one of the best official festivals in the world. But we get shows like this coming to the city on the tails of the real festival. I would urge the silent
majority to speak out.‘
Fortunately, the silent majority weren’t as vocal as clear Morra on Indian dancer Shakti’s The Kama Sutra — The
Book Of Love.
’My memories of the Fringe are vague and tinged with nostalgia. I remember performing in what was to become the Traverse with John Cleese and Graham Chapman to a very embarrassed audience of two and having to cut minutes off the Saturday late revue to be finished
before the Sabbath.’
I". 7. has fruit/en the boards herself, 76;" The nymnw didn’t dare ask but tale to prefix/no that no nudity
:ll 1"/
was involved
'This kind of thing was the end of Greece and the end of Rome — we fought a war for decency and to get rid of Hitler, and he used to watch this kind of thing along
with sex romps.’ Moira draws an obvious parallel
hetwei-m last year’s Fringe show The AZ Of Drugs and the causes of two
,mtiont civil/sat/Oiis’ decline (Ne/l Cooper)
Club Swing: 'a dirty-minded disgrace’, thankfully
R 1.1mm 1997 THE LIST 11