The Edinburgh Festival Fringe is the biggest arts festival in the world, with nearly 3,500 shows. This year, Playbill is in Edinburgh for the entire month in August for the festival and we’re taking you with us. Follow along as we cover every single aspect of the Fringe, aka our real-life Brigadoon!
As part of our Edinburgh Fringe coverage, Playbill is seeing a whole lotta shows—and we're sharing which ones you absolutely must see if you're only at the Fringe for a short amount of time. Consider these Playbill Picks a friendly, opinionated guide as you try to choose a show at the festival.
Australian-based circus company Circa has returned to Edinburgh Festival Fringe this year with its risqué show Peepshow (Club Remix). And wow, does it deliver. Seven acrobats and an onstage DJ combine nightclub ambience with eye-widening acrobatics and cheeky nods to burlesque and cabaret. The result is an adults-only show (all performers strip down at one point to nude-colored thongs). That being said, the incredible circus artistry is prioritized ahead of seducing the audience.
Some of the tricks will certainly make you laugh, like when a performer strip-teases out of a spacesuit, which features zippers that are undone over her breasts—only for the reveal to be another acrobat’s hands in red velvet gloves poking through, spinning socks in a nod to the classic burlesque move of twirling nipple tassels. If you’re paying attention to the neon sign above their heads spelling Peepshow, you might notice during this number that the “o” is a different color from the rest, in a cheeky wink of set design.
Much of the show left the crowd gasping, ahh-ing, and holding their breath. In a duet, one acrobat wore sparkly red stilettos as she walked onto the back of her partner. With the sharp points digging into his body, they maneuvered so that she never touched the ground until the end of the routine. In a dominatrix-inspired piece, she sometimes manipulated him how she wished, and stood on various parts of his body—standing on his shoulders, his inner thighs, his chest. All in pointy stilettos. For those still keeping an eye on the set design, Peepshow became just “ow” in red.
But being provocative and playing for laughs didn’t come before the sheer talent in acrobatics displayed. The ease with which one aerialist climbed the silks by stepping on her co-stars through the dark silk fabric was a display of trust and practice that was subtle, but utterly impressive. If you’re looking for moments that more obviously make you ask, “how do they do that,” don’t worry. You’ll see one of them do a split balancing her feet on her co-stars’ heads, and tricks that takes the performers up at least 20 feet in the air.
At one point, an acrobat seemed to halt in time—during a completely effortless jump, her momentum suddenly halted in ways that took such control. It was little surprise that for a final trick at the end of the show, that same performer became the connective top of a dazzling display. Six of the seven acrobats were arranged in standing pairs, each featuring one acrobat standing on the shoulders of their partner. And the final acrobat became the top of a tripod-like arrangement, performing an inverted bridge with legs and hands held by the three acrobats on the second tier of the trick. It was a more introspective move due to the soundtrack being moody, somber cover of Eurythmics’ “Sweet Dreams.” The arrangement—of standing on the shoulders of others and the precariousness of being at the top—hinted at a comment alongside the lyrics.
Peepshow (Club Remix) dazzles (quite literally—the main costume the acrobats wear are brightly-colored and glittery shorts). Overall, it’s a fun show that delivers on what it sets out to be: a little risqué, a little funny, and an hour of wonder as we remember the physical artistry human bodies are capable of.
Peepshow (Club Remix) runs at Underbelly’s Circus Hub in The Meadows through August 26 at 6:20.
