HEADER IMAGE Succubus, photography by Myla Faith
Edinburgh Fringe Festival has always been home to the weird, the wonderful and the “what the fuck did I just watch?” It’s the place where artists take risks, where the next cult favourite often begins life in a cramped room above a pub, and where the shows everyone is talking about next year are already finding their audience.
Some of the biggest cultural success stories of the past decade – from Fleabag to Baby Reindeer – started life at the Fringe, while countless comedians who’ve gone on to become household names first honed their craft in the Scottish capital. Long before something becomes a West End transfer, a streaming hit or a viral recommendation, chances are it played the Fringe first – and who doesn’t like being ahead of the hype?
This year’s programme is no different. Across horror, comedy, musicals and experimental live performance, the shows below are united by a willingness to interrogate the world we’re living in: from internet fandoms and podcast culture to climate anxiety, conspiracy theories, cults, parasocial relationships and the messy politics of identity. If you’re heading to Edinburgh this August, these are the productions we think deserve a look-in.
Badgers, Malaika Kegode
Award-winning writer and poet Malaika Kegode combines folk horror, investigative journalism and family grief in a story that asks who gets to tell other people’s histories (Ryan Murphy, we’re looking at you). When struggling podcaster Meles returns to a town haunted by disappearances, local mythology and an unsettling folk song, what begins as an attempt to revive a fading career slowly unravels into something far more ethically complicated.
Kegode’s past work has been praised for pairing lyrical language with emotional precision, and Badgers looks set to continue that tradition, using the mechanics of true crime and podcast culture to question our appetite for narratives that aren’t ours to exploit. Rather than simply borrowing the aesthetics of internet-era storytelling, it interrogates them, making this an intriguing prospect for anyone fascinated by folklore, digital culture and the politics of who controls a story.
Bigfoot Ripped My Dog In Half I Saw It, Xhloe and Natasha
If you’ve somehow missed the rise of New York duo Xhloe and Natasha, the Fringe is the best place to be introduced. After building a devoted cult following and collecting three consecutive Fringe First awards, they’re back with an absurdist physical theatre piece that turns Appalachian Bigfoot folklore into a razor-sharp study of conspiracy culture, collective paranoia and manufactured distraction.
Combining clowning, Brechtian theatre, intricate movement and an enormous puppet, the show follows two teenagers whose fake monster sightings spiral into something terrifyingly believable. Early previews suggest it promises to be as formally inventive as it is politically astute, balancing genuine laughs with an unsettling reminder that people rarely believe what they see – only what they’re primed to.
Bog Witch, Bryony Kimmings
Bryony Kimmings has long blurred the line between autobiography, activism and theatrical experimentation, and Bog Witch may be her most intimate work yet. Drawing from her decision to leave city life behind in search of something slower and more sustainable, the show explores motherhood, burnout and environmental collapse through the lens of someone attempting to reconnect with the natural world before it feels too late.
Critics have described the production as both hauntingly funny and emotionally expansive, praising its ability to hold climate anxiety alongside deeply personal questions about care, survival and belonging. Rather than offering easy answers, Bog Witch weaves myth, humour and confession into this take on ecological crisis that feels both timeless and unmistakably contemporary.
CREEP, Harriet Richardson
Artist, comedian and confessional writer Harriet Richardson‘s Fringe debut sits somewhere between self-deprecating stand-up and psychological horror, unpacking the uncomfortable space where fascination mutates into obsession. Beginning with an apparently ordinary celebrity crush, CREEP spirals into an exploration of shame, parasocial desire and the stories we tell ourselves to justify behaviour we’d rather not examine too closely.
Richardson is already a favourite at BRICKS, with her audacious Substack articles frequently shared among our office group chat. And, at a time when internet culture has decisively decimated the boundaries between intimacy and spectatorship, CREEP feels especially timely, examining the strange emotional economies created by screens, fandom and the illusion of knowing someone you’ve never met.
EVITA TOO, Sh!t Theatre
Nobody does gleefully chaotic political theatre quite like Sh!t Theatre. The Fringe First-winning duo return with EVITA TOO, an irreverent musical odyssey inspired by the forgotten story of the world’s first female president, blending historical research with songs, satire, documentary detours and their trademark willingness to veer spectacularly off course.
Reviews of their previous work consistently celebrate their ability to make serious political ideas feel anarchically entertaining, and early buzz suggests this latest show continues that balancing act. Expect Argentine history, feminist revisionism, theatrical self-sabotage and, apparently, naked roller-skating, all deployed in service of asking why certain women are written into history while others disappear from it. It sounds gloriously ridiculous, but (as with the duo’s best work) the silliness is likely to conceal something surprisingly incisive underneath.
HAM, The Hotter Project
Shakespeare has never looked – or smelled – quite like this. HAM takes Hamlet and grinds it through contemporary debates around veganism, eco-anxiety, masculinity and moral purity, following a grieving vegan whose quest for revenge becomes increasingly theatrical. The Hotter Project have built a reputation for visceral, physically daring work, with The Guardian praising their productions as vividly alive, and this latest piece appears to embrace glorious excess without losing sight of its bigger questions.
Equally a tragic farce and an environmental reckoning, HAM explores what happens when personal ethics become all-consuming, finding comedy in ideological certainty while refusing to dismiss the urgency of the climate crisis itself. It sounds gloriously unhinged, and exactly the sort of high-concept experiment the Fringe does best.
Heated Rivalry: The Unauthorised Musical Parody, Alan Kliffer & Christian Palomares
What happens when fan fiction escapes the group chat and finds its way onto the stage? Heated Rivalry: The Musical Parody transforms this year’s beloved queer hockey romance into a knowingly chaotic musical comedy, celebrating the internet communities that turned an enemies-to-lovers sports romance into a cult phenomenon. Having already gained its own viral approval from TV-show lovers (mere weeks after the show had aired), this performance balances affectionate parody with an understanding of why stories like these resonate so deeply: queer desire, emotional vulnerability, and the joy of seeing niche obsessions become global favourites.
Expect big musical numbers, plenty of self-aware humour and enough references to keep devoted fans grinning, while remaining playful enough that newcomers won’t feel left out. In an era where online fandom increasingly shapes what gets adapted, celebrated and canonised, this unauthorised musical feels like a fittingly meta love letter to the passionate communities that keep the hype alive and kicking.
Prophets, Jack MacGregor
Fringe First-winning playwright Jack MacGregor offers a change of pace in this slow-burning psychological thriller set on the isolated island of Saint Helena. In Prophets, academic fieldwork gradually becomes an unnerving portrait of religious extremism as a Scottish researcher discovers an increasingly powerful cult preparing for paradise.
Rather than treating faith itself as the enemy, Prophets appears more interested in the mechanisms of charismatic leadership, collective belief and the seductive appeal of certainty during periods of instability.
SUCCUBUS, Georgina Collins & Halfway Productions
Body horror meets feminist revenge fantasy in Georgina Collins‘ debut play, which asks what might happen if every woman who’d ever been told she was “just hormonal” turned out to be transforming into something genuinely monstrous. Framed as a horror-comedy, SUCCUBUS follows a young woman whose mysterious new cravings force her to rethink not only her body, but the systems that have consistently failed to listen to it.
The show is reported to play with ideas of ethical consumption, rage and survival, borrowing knowingly from cult horror classics, and is designed for audiences who enjoy their social commentary with plenty of blood and bite.
The Subplot: A hyperfixation on the Titan submersible, Sophie Smyth & Quiet Riot
While the internet became briefly infatuated with the Titan submersible before abruptly moving on, Sophie Smyth did not. This multimedia solo show uses the OceanGate disaster as a starting point for a wider exploration of autism, hyperfixation and the peculiar emotional landscapes created by online research rabbit holes. Rather than treating neurodivergence as a punchline or diagnosis, The Subplot asks what it means to care intensely in a culture that rarely lingers on anything for long, finding unexpected humour in the strange corners of the internet where people build entire worlds from unanswered questions.
Armed with a laptop, a game controller and years of accumulated knowledge, Smyth turns what could have been a niche fascination into what is set to be a surprisingly moving meditation on mortality, curiosity and the fine line between dedication and obsession.
Roleplay, Hannah Reilly & Francesca Moody
When Francesca Moody backs a Fringe show, it’s worth paying attention. The producer behind Fleabag and Baby Reindeer returns with Australian writer-performer Hannah Reilly‘s uncomfortably current one-woman drama about influence, feminism and the economics of online identity. After her feminist podcast fails to pay the bills, the protagonist reinvents herself as a viral “slutfluencer”, only to discover that performing empowerment for an audience quickly becomes indistinguishable from commodifying herself.
Early previews have singled out the show’s sharp writing and willingness to engage with contradictions rather than easy answers, interrogating personal branding, sex positivity and digital capitalism without slipping into moral panic. It’s a story that understands the internet isn’t separate from real life anymore, and asks what parts of ourselves we’re willing to package in exchange for visibility.
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