The Free Edinburgh Fringe Festival is a programme of free entry events that takes place at the
Edinburgh Festival Fringe, the world's largest arts festival, each August. It is organised by the comedy promoter
Laughing Horse, although it includes shows of different genres, and is one of several "free" festivals taking place in the city at that time, most of which incorporate the words free, fringe and/or festival in their title, often leading to confusion.
Free Edinburgh Fringe Festival venues are commonly independently run bars and nightclubs which create performance spaces in their premises for the duration of the Fringe Festival. Performers are allocated timeslots for free on the condition that they do not charge audiences an entry fee to watch the show.
Although audience members are asked to make voluntary contributions at the end of the shows to help pay the performers expenses.
Generally, Edinburgh Fringe shows are self-financing and the average run at the fringe can cost a performer £5000 in venue hire fees, publicity and accommodation. The aim of The Free Festival is to provide performers and festival goers with a cheaper alternative.
Predominantly the shows are
stand up comedy
Stand-up comedy is a comedic performance to a live audience in which the performer addresses the audience directly from the stage. The performer is known as a comedian, a comic or a stand-up.
Stand-up comedy consists of one-liners, stories, ...
and
sketch comedy but in recent years there has been an increase in
theatre
Theatre or theater is a collaborative form of performing art that uses live performers, usually actors or actresses, to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place, often a stage. The perform ...
,
cabaret
Cabaret is a form of theatrical entertainment featuring music, song, dance, recitation, or drama. The performance venue might be a pub, a casino, a hotel, a restaurant, or a nightclub with a stage for performances. The audience, often dining o ...
,
music
Music is generally defined as the art of arranging sound to create some combination of form, harmony, melody, rhythm or otherwise expressive content. Exact definitions of music vary considerably around the world, though it is an aspe ...
,
storytelling and children’s shows.
Free Festival programme
The Free Festival promotes comedy, theatre, music, cabaret, opera, musicals, film, children’s shows, events and art displays – programmed by experienced producers in each area. Award winning performers and full runs of shows from the likes of Pappy’s Fun Club,
John Gordillo
John Gordillo is a director and former comedian. He has directed and produced live shows, specials and TV series for Eddie Izzard, Reginald D Hunter, Ross Noble, Josh Widdicombe, Dylan Moran, Michael Mcintyre, Mark Steel, Shappi Khorsandi, Sea ...
,
Lewis Schaffer, Nick Wilty, Sol Bernstein,
Steve Day,
Bob Slayer, Nik Coppin and
Ivor Dembina
Ivor Joseph Dembina (born 14 April 1951) is a British stand-up comedian and writer in the alternative comedy, alternative tradition from London.
Career
Dembina attributed his early "reputation for generally doing some decent gigs" to having "t ...
have appeared in previous years, plus guest appearances in compilation shows from well known performers such as
Alan Carr
Alan Graham Carr (born 14 June 1976) is an English comedian, broadcaster and writer. His breakthrough was in 2001, winning the '' City Life'' Best Newcomer of the Year and the BBC New Comedy Awards. In the ensuing years, Carr's career burgeon ...
,
Scott Capurro,
Richard Herring
Richard Keith Herring (born 12 July 1967) is an English stand-up comedian and writer, whose early work includes the comedy double act Lee and Herring (alongside Stewart Lee). He is described by ''The British Theatre Guide'' as "one of the lead ...
,
Brendon Burns,
Marcus Brigstocke
Marcus Alexander Brigstocke (born 8 May 1973) is a British comedian, actor and satirist. He has worked in stand-up comedy, television, radio and musical theatre. He has appeared on many BBC television and radio shows.
Early life
Brigstocke is ...
,
Reg D. Hunter,
Dan Antopolski
Dan Antopolski (born 22 August 1972) is a British comic, actor and writer. He has appeared in various television programs and radio shows, and is best known to younger audiences for hosting the UK game show ''The Dare Devil''. In 1998 Antopol ...
and
Paul Foot.
Critical acclaim
The Free Festival has received coverage from Sky News, BBC, Culture Show, The Guardian, The Times, The Scotsman, The List, Metro, Chortle and many other local publications. In 2009 75% of Free Festival shows were reviewed 3 star and above, with thirty 4-star and 20 5-star reviews.
2010 facts
In 2010 the Free Festival produced over 300 shows at the fringe.
Imran Yusuf's Free Festival show became the first non-ticketed show at the Edinburgh Festival to be nominated for a main Comedy Award for Best Newcomer
2009 facts
In 2009 there were a total of 2,098 shows at the
Edinburgh Festival Fringe and 235 of these (over 11%) were part of the Free Festival making it the largest promoter of free events at the Fringe, and after the
Edinburgh Comedy Festival
Edinburgh Comedy Festival was a short-lived festival of comedy shows which operated during the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in August 2008 and 2009. Effectively a marketing campaign for the "Big Four" venues at the Fringe - Assembly, Gilded Balloo ...
the second largest promoter of Comedy).
* 22 stages across 14 Venues
* Venue capacities from 50 to 150
* 235 shows (Over 11% of all shows at Edinburgh Fringe)
* 3,500 performances (140 per day)
* 50,000 Free Festival brochures
* 100,000 website visitors (over 500,000 page impressions)
* 180,000 free tickets (7,200 per day)
* 1,175,000 flyers (average of 5000 per show)
Previous accolades
In 2007 the
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
produced a radio comedy pilot based on Ian Fox's 2006 Free Fringe Show The Butterfly Effect
Edinburgh venues that are part of the Free Edinburgh Fringe Festival:
New Venues in 2010
* The Metropole Cafe (Venue 141)
* The Reverie (Venue 270)
* Three Sisters (venue 272)
* Laughing Horse Online (venue 194)
Other Venues
* The Argyle Bar (venue 353)
* Cafe Renroc (venue 84)
* The City Cafe (venue 85)
* Edinburgh City Football Club (venue 164)
* Espionage (venue 185)
* The Hive (venue 313)
* Jekyll & Hyde (venue 259)
* The Meadow Bar (venue 264)
* The National Museum of Scotland
* The Newsroom (venue 93)
* St. Martins Church
* Berlin
* Ego
* Hillside
* Lindsay's
* Meridian
* The Outhouse
* The Counting House (venue 170)
* The Pear Tree
* The Blind Poet
since 2004. It was originally in a partnership with The
In 2011 Bob Slayer, a performer and previous booker for the Free Festival set up independent fringe promoter
in a former Free Festival venue: Heroes @ The Hive. The move was amicable and the two organisations maintain a working relationship. In 2013 Heroes added a second venue Heroes @ Bob & Miss Behave's Bookshop. Heroes shows have won three Malcolm Hardee Awards and been nominated for several other awards. In 2013
won the Edinburgh Fringe Awards (formerly the Perrier) panel prize for spirit of the Fringe.