12 Sep 2024
Sam Brooks went to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in a delegation supported by Creative New Zealand’s International Market Development Fund and the British Council New Zealand and the Pacific. He offers five observations for anyone wanting to attend the festival in the future.
Don’t go in blind
Nowhere in the world is like the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.
In the space of three weeks in August, thousands of shows, and tens of thousands of artists flock to a city that has a third of the population of Auckland. You will be bombarded by posters on every corner, then the artists that feature on those posters on every other corner, and you will not be able to escape.
It's very overwhelming. Any familiarity you can get with the festival and its specific pace before you go will set you up much better for any future professional endeavours. Whether that’s as a tourist or working the festival in a non-artist capacity, spending time there familiarising yourself with the pace and the vibe will save you a trial by fire.
Put simply: the last thing you want is to be figuring out where to get a healthy meal at the same time you’re trying to hustle audiences into your show.
It’s more than just a fringe festival
Edinburgh Fringe Festival is a fringe festival in name only.
If you go in expecting something on the level of fringe festivals in our country, it’ll eat you alive. In the same day, even in the same hour, you can see a show that could be found in our biggest arts festivals, and a show that might play a community hall or even someone’s garage here. The scale of it is massive, and encompasses shows from all places in the world, and all ranges across the funding spectrum.
However, it is also an arts market, the biggest in the world. It’s a place where people are planning the next year or even several years of their venues, festivals, and careers over countless meetings. It is a platform for both shows and artists to jump from.
It is a fast-paced long game
The weird dichotomy of Edinburgh is that, in the moment, it is extremely fast paced. I found myself running from venue to venue, catching the shows that had gotten buzz only after they opened and were on the verge of selling out.
However, on the flipside , I also found myself talking to people and laying down the foundations for opportunities that might only bear fruit in the months or even years to come. Laying these foundations happened quickly, in the moment, in meetings that might be grasped in half hours between shows, over hastily poured drinks in plastic cups or food truck kai.
If you go, get ready to hold both paces in your brain at the same time. Embrace the moment but be aware that some of the energy you spend there might not pay off in that moment.
Know what you want to get out of the festival
The good thing about hearing the same advice time and time again is that you know that it’s probably the advice to listen to. The thing I heard maybe more than anything during my time in Edinburgh, whether it was from artists, presenters or programmers is that if you go to Edinburgh, you need to know what you want to get out of your time there.
Do you want to sell out your show? (Of course.) Do you want to get reviewed by a major publication? (Of course.) Do you want to get programmed around the world for future seasons of your show around the world? (The dream!) Do you want to see as many shows as you can and widen your mind? (Probably.) Do you want to have a good time? (Also probably.)
Or do you simply just want to experience the largest fringe festival and arts market in the world?
These are all achievable goals. Are they all achievable at the same time? Sorry to say, but probably not. Focus on one, maybe two, and take steps to achieve that. This will also stop you from burning out trying to do everything.
Your real resource is people
This sounds extremely corny and earnest, but sometimes the most corny and earnest adages are the ones often that hold true: the thing that will get you through the Edinburgh Fringe Festival are the people around you. It’s the relationships you’ve formed on previous trips, or even back home. It’s people supporting each other by seeing each other’s shows, talking about each other’s shows, and even just being around for a quick coffee to vent.
That resource doesn’t just exist inside the three weeks of the festival, though. It exists with people who have been before, the wisdom and contacts that they can provide. Nobody wants anybody else to have a bad time at the festival; rising tides lift all ships .
A festival is made by the people who are in and around it, and in my experience, the people around Edinburgh are pretty damn ready to welcome you to be there.
Further reading:
More reflections on the Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2024 at Ensemble Magazine
Talking to Culture 101 about the Edinburgh Fringe Festival on RNZ
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