I tried to go to 10 Edinburgh Fringe shows in 1 day – here's what happened

The National

a day ago

During my mission, I didn't want to just see and review shows, but observe the city, the energy and how much the public was actually enjoying themselves.
This year, the total number of shows has risen to 3853, accompanied by a staggering 54,474 performances across 265 venues.
For context, this makes 2025 the second-largest Fringe ever, trailing only the 2019 record of around 4105 shows. While not yet up to pre-pandemic scale, the annual rhetoric of the city being overtaken by the Fringe continues, and so I entered the day wondering; how many shows is too many shows?
How it all began
AS any good journalist for The National should, I started the day at 9.30am with A Political Breakfast, at the Hot Toddy. Advertised as a show were comedians who wake up in time join a panel to discuss a range of topics over their morning coffee, I was actively excited for this.
The large room I entered was full, and the 40-plus folk were, in true Fringe style, from all over the world. The parallels in politics from all corners of the earth were drawn as we discussed the monarchy to attitudes towards driving instructors. Will Jeremy Corbyn help Nigel Farage become Prime Minister? Is Charles a better King than Elizabeth was Queen?
The comedians in attendance were on fire for 9.30am, and Harun Musho'd hosted the discussion incredibly well.
This was a Free Fringe show. The Free Fringe came into existence in 1996 to try and mitigate what the industry saw as the exploitation of artists by the paid Fringe.
"If you see a paid Fringe show, chances are, none of the performers are making any money and they are probably losing loads," Musho'd told the audience at one point in the show where they took five minutes to all plug their individual shows. As he spoke, his fellow comedians nodded.
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Musho'd continued: "That's what happens at most paid Fringe shows, and they are usually screwed by the venues by the way their fee structure is. I think the venues are screwed over on the other end but that's another story.
"The only way to make money at the paid Fringe is to be famous in the first place, then have a sold-out run in a big venue. The Free Fringe was designed to do something about that."
Artists don't pay for the venue, and the audience is not charged. The whole thing runs on voluntary donations and the fact audience members buy things, such as drink or food, from the venues while they are there.
Musho'd added: "The Free Fringe is a non-profit making organisation but is more accurately described as a 'almost goes bust every year' organisation."
If A Political Breakfast was a paid Fringe Show, the audience would have been paying about £10-15 each for a ticket, with the average across the Fringe in 2024 at around £12, though prices could sometimes climb as high as £50-60.
Musho'd told the audience, don't pay if you don't want to, with another point of the Free Fringe being that the public can see shows before they pay.
Musho'd is on the board of trustees for the Fringe Society and he is questioning where the money from the Fringe goes, as according to him, "nobody actually knows".
He added: "We need to find out, so I'm actually trying to persuade universities to put up a study about the economics, and the impact [of the Fringe] and where the money goes."
Will Edinburgh's visitor levy help see the city see more money from the Fringe?
"I think that Edinburgh is unbelievably lucky to have the festival," Kat Brogan, managing director of Mercat Tours, told me after my first show.
"It brings everybody here where we can shine, and in this day and age, to have everybody talking and listening and thinking physically together – and they're doing all of that in Edinburgh – it shows us why we were the city of enlightenment.
"It's a bit of a scary world out there so the idea that humans can come together and do something really positive, I think that's a huge privilege to host."
Having just been in a room where more than 40 folk all discussing politics without any voices being raised or a whiff of tension, I couldn't help but agree.
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There is also a rhetoric of tourists overrunning the city, however, Brogan tells me that "locals are actually the biggest audience, which is not often reported".
Edinburgh locals made up the largest audience segment in 2024, representing 33% of ticket buyers. Combined with visitors from elsewhere in Scotland (15%), local and domestic attendees accounted for nearly half of all Fringe ticket purchases last year.
Brogan sees the Fringe as one of the country's greatest adverts for tourists to visit, not just in August, and enjoy Scottish culture – as well as an immense benefit to locals.
"The Fringe is a charity, they do work year round to benefit locals, and physically the spread of events is happening, so we just need to keep listening. Ask and listen, they're the experts," she adds, while highlighting Fringe By the Sea as one way the festival is moving out of the concentrated Old Town.
Brogan is also on the advisory forum for Edinburgh's Visitor Levy, and is "really excited" about the prospects of it.
Councillors in Edinburgh have approved a 5% per night charge, capped at seven nights, which will apply to those staying in hotels, bed and breakfasts, and other forms of accommodation, including holiday lets.
"We've got a chance to steer potential decisions and then listen and and take the right path for locals. There's an awful lot of negativity and speculation about something that doesn't actually exist yet," Brogan explains.
The advisory forum is meeting in September, where they will be given proposals by the council of what they suggest spending the money on, before members consult and discuss and make recommendations back.
She added: "We're the first visitor levy in the UK, there's a lot of people working awfully hard to try and get it right, and I would just urge people to give it a try and get behind and understand the intention, and yes, there's still work to be done, but it's not here yet.
"There's still time to make changes and and steer us on the correct course as far as the community and businesses are concerned."
Up next ...
With the very live concerns of the Free Fringe, the festival acting as an advert for the city, and the visitor levy swirling in my brain, I continued on my quest to see and review 10 shows.
Next was Florence, a one-woman show starring and written by Honour Santes Barnes on George Street.
The satirical tragicomic play follows the story of an ambitious young woman willing to use any means necessary to secure her success in the art world. Even if it means taking on a new identity.
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This was the show's first performance and the crowd loved it. It will definitely be one of the many hits of the festival. I thoroughly enjoyed seeing the demographic of the audience (mostly young women) and found that throughout the day, taking in what kind of audience turned up for each show was just as entertaining as the shows themselves.
Then, heading back to politics, I ventured to the C-venues on Victoria Terrace. This meant a 20-minute walk up the Mound. It was at this point I realised I had to be much more tactical about my geographical decisions if wanted any chance of seeing 10 shows.
With a much-needed coffee, I saw Dreams of Peace and Freedom, a song cycle commemorating Edinburgh-born David Maxwell Fyfe.
Fyfe was a prosecuting counsel at the Nuremberg Trials, a human rights lawyer and a key figure in drafting the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).
Performed by descendants of Maxwell, Robert and Lily Blackmore (above), alongside Sue Casson, the trio gave the audience a love letter to Edinburgh, as well as to the values of peace, freedom and remembrance.
Three down, and all quite intense, I needed some comedy to perk me up.
A change of pace
Australian comic Zoe Coombs Marr (below) came to the Monkey Barrel with so much energy for The Splash Zone.
The premise of the show is what it means to be "in the splash one" of a comedy show, and who a comedian on stage wants in the audience. It is all rooted in one instance when Marr learned Trump fans were in her audience at one show, and she began to ponder about the relationship between performer and audience.
Her crowd work, full-circle jokes, and observational comedy was some of the best I'd seen, and it felt there had been an important topic explored.
"If we get locked in our own zones, we lose all the other stuff and people outside," she said at the end.
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"We have to stay engaged, keep looking into each other's eyes, and leaning into the discomfort."
Marr is also donating 50% of everything she earns during her run to an aid charity supporting those on the ground in Gaza.
Afterwards, I went to Love Letter to a Sandwich by Alvin Liu, a performance of One Man Poe by Stephen Smith, When Billy met Alasdair by Alan Bissett, a very late comedy set by Rebecca Lamb, and an even later show called When Time Bends.
You can read all reviews from the day here.
I saw 9 shows in one day — and loved it
As you have probably figured out by now, I did not manage the 10. I ended the Monday night with nine shows under my belt.
I did gain a new sense of love for the city — when I hadn't planned to.
Yes, the exploitation of artists must be faced, and questions have to be answered over where the money from the Fringe really goes. There also has to be more work done on shifting further towards the festival's candid grassroots origins rather than the current corporate, profit-driven model, acknowledging when the oversaturation of shows should end, as well as the physical and mental toll on both artists, festival staff and other businesses in the city.
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However, credit must be given on where organisers are making moves to improve aspects, such as providing mental health support for artists, creating networking hubs for peers, collaborators, agents, and producers, as well as the continued ultimate success of the world's largest arts festival.
I thought I'd end the day grumbling, frustrated by the tourists clogging the pavements, the lack of space to move, and the ever-climbing festival ticket prices.
But where else on earth could you step out of a show about four people earnestly attempting to 'improve' a ham sandwich with rice and soy sauce, straight into a demonic retelling of Edgar Allan Poe's greatest works, then find yourself in the lobby of a Radisson Blu, deep in conversation with a physicist, before the two of you try to unravel a queer drama where the only person not confused is the director — who is weeping uncontrollably?