Equity@Edinburgh - pt 2

With the workshop completed I had a clear head to take in some shows. The amount of shows available is some what over whelming. It’s never going to be possible to see every show you want to see especially when like me you only have 3 days. So I took the flash card approach. When I arrived at the Festival last night the Edinburgh program awaited me on my bed. The Fringe program is divided in to sections Children's Shows, Comedy, Dance & Physical Theatre, Events, Exhibitions, Music, Musicals & Opera and Theatre. The sections I focused on was Theatre and Dance & Physical Theatre. Plays and Shows with multimedia, visual and auditory spectacle, experiences. I then skim read those sections, marking with a star the ones that caught my eye and marked with 2 stars the ones I definitely had to see. Last year (my first visit to the Fringe) I discovered Social Media theatre seeing MySpace the musical. This year I found productions telling cautionary tales of the evolving on line world, the absurdity of the working world and how converging technology injects humor and surreal abstraction to daily life. Reflecting on the modern world theatre is a powerful and as relevant medium for social commentary as it ever was. Politically dogmatic plays synonymous with the fringe movements roots in the 60’s and 70’s have given way to the observation of the changing world. May be my interest in IT makes those shows stand out.

I decided to experiment with the N95 media phone, QIK, Flixwagon and live streaming. I love the notion of maintaining a dynamic fresh web presence using services and tool that free the blogger from the desktop PC, live bogging… doing stuff rather that I did stuff. Here are the “to camera” pieces I did daily to capture for myself and invite viewers to my join my journey. I am no film maker and hate appearing in camera so its also a cathartic process of pushing past the discomfort I feel doing them. Not sure I will ever get over it but the ends justify the means. It’s a great way to engage and being such a visual person I want to show and share.