Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú

The Fringe draws to a close today after what many people are predicting is going to be a record year.

Stay at home audiences seem to be the main factor in the upturn - which has seen some venues up by as much as 50% in the opening weeks - but having a working box office has also helped get back on track after last year's box office melt-down.

But for many shows, the Fringe is just the starting point. The creators of Crabbit - a children's musical - which has been at the Gilded Balloon for the past few weeks are hopeful it'll guarantee them a short run in a theatre in London's West End.

The show is based on a book by Edinburgh based author Julie Hegarty, who's been touring the show's anti-bullying message round Scottish schools for the past three years.

The recession was the unlikely catalyst for turning it into a musical. Husband Tim had been a songwriter with Irish band D:ream when they first met and returned to the trade with the demise of his property company.

Now they're in talks with an animation company as well as hoping to take the show on tour around the UK.

Others going on to London include David O'Doherty, Reginald D Hunter, Laura Solon the Pajama Men, Kim Noble, Mikelangelo and The Black Sea Gentlemen, Paul Foot, Allan Cochraine and Shappi Khorsandi.

Many comedians will be off to the other comedy festivals - including the well respected Australian events (Melbourne in particular sees a lot of trade between the two countries). Many of those who staff the festivals will also head down under.

Maria Teece who's performing in Viva has a worldwide tour ahead with dates in Dubrovnik, Dublin Fringe Festival and New York, followed by a tour of Ireland.

David Leddy's double bill is going in two directions - Sessurus is going to Oxford and Milan while his show White Tea - in which the audience wears kimonos and sips tea - is touring Scotland immediately after the festival.

Meanwhile, three shows will be back at next year's international festival as winners of the Edinburgh International Festival Fringe Prize 2009. The prize encourages greater co-operation between fringe and international festival by selecting work from this year's fringe, to be staged again at next year's festival.

This year's selection - announced this morning - includes a Gothic puppet play - Lily Through the Dark by Hampshire-based theatre company The River People, the aforementioned White Tea by our very own David Leddy and Is That All There Is, a blistering comedy drama about a couple on the brink of marriage by Inspector Sands theatre company.

All three shows will feature in next year's Edinburgh International Festival programme.

Nice to see that environmental art company NVA have managed to find another way of keeping their work alive long after the show is over.

The Glasgow-based company created the ambitious work Half Life with the National Theatre of Scotland two years ago. As well as a performance in a forest in Argyll, it included walks and art interventions in historic sites around the area - regarded as one of the richest spots in the world as far as neolithic culture goes.

NVA now have a website which gives new interpretations of the works and the sites that can still be visited, along with downloadable maps and directions.

The four main routes include some of the most powerful existing Neolithic sites and forts in the area along with three NVA interventions, designed by Simon Costin and James Johnson in collaboration with Angus Farquhar. For more information see www.halflife.org.uk

Meanwhile better late than never for the Edinburgh International Festival. A performance of Don Quixote which had to be cancelled last year when the Staatskapelle Dresden made it to Edinburgh but their instruments didn't, is being restaged tonight.

Festival director Jonathan Mills promised the show would go on and true to his word, the Strauss piece will be played tonight by the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú SSO under their new conductor Donald Runnicles, alongside works by Brahms and Webern.

Cellist, Jan Vogler, who was due to play in last year's concert, is the soloist.

Who would have thought Edinburgh's Tramworks would provide not just artistic - but musical inspiration.

The Milestone carve at Edinburgh College of Art - which involved 10 international artists carving 20 tonnes of different kinds of stone is drawing to a close.

Among the works, one by Japanese artist Atsuo Okamoto who unearthed his basalt glacial erratic boulder from excavations at the new tram terminus on the outskirts of Edinburgh.

For the past few weeks, he's been using a drill taller than himself to hollow out the boulder and in the process created a brand new musical instrument.

He demonstrates a trumpet sound using a long metal pole inserted into one of the gaps, but mostly he says, people have been using it as a drum.

"It's so busy here during the day, so noisy, but at night time, when it's a little quieter, people have been coming along, having a drink and then drumming. We have drumming workshops."

Gerard Mas from Spain set himself the challenge of transforming his Dorset limestone into a sheep, sculpting instead of shearing.

"It was not as easy as I thought," he admits," which is why I've decided to keep some woolly sheep and some sheared sheep."

For the record, even in stone rather than wool, the sheep's skin looks surprisingly lifelike.

The sculptures will remain outside the college building for just another day or two - except Hayashi Takeshi's work which is inside the main building.

There, visitors are encouraged to take off their shoes and walk barefoot across the stone carpet so they can feel the different textures.

The shape - he tells me - is the size of a traditional Japanese carpet, particularly those associated with tea ceremonies but the sandstone is as Scottish as it comes, from Corsehill in Dumfriesshire.

The works will now be transferred to Yorkshire Sculpture Park for a major exhibition which begins later this year.

After that, they'll transfer to the Pier Arts Centre in Orkney before ending up at Goodwood.

It's hard to find something truly different at the Edinburgh Festival.

Not because of a lack of imagination on the part of the performers but because of the sheer volume of shows.

Dance, music, stand up comedy, opera, farce, mime, it all begins to blend into another.

So Claire Cunningham's achievement in her show Mobile/Evolution is even more remarkable.

It's a personal tale about her own reliance on crutches - she's used them since she was 14 - and the power of dance in increasing her strength, her abilities and her confidence.

As she spins her way around the stage, sometimes above it on a trapeze made out of crutches, she explains the practicalities - too short, too long, makes your arms ache after a while - of assuming one size fits all.

It's far from a "poor me" approach. Far from it. It's a confident, and uplifting show, Claire's charm ensuring it's never uncomfortable even when its issues are.

And it's hard not to beam as she spins around the room in her finale of Singing in the Rain.

Sadly the Edinburgh run ended last night but hopefully we'll see more of her work in the future.

Had to be fast to catch up with comedian Eddie Izzard on his latest outing in Edinburgh.

The actor and comedian is currently 614 miles into a thousand mile run around the UK - that's the equivalent of a marathon a day, six days a week, all in the aid of Sport Relief.

Even on his day off, he can't resist a run. A press conference at the Pleasance to promote the project is followed by a short sharp run up Arthur's Seat - accompanied by some fellow comedians and the fittest local journalists.

He admitted his feet are suffering - "even the blisters have blisters" - and he's pulled muscles he didn't even know he had - but having entered the world of the ultra marathon runner, he's not going to let go in a hurry.

"The great thing about acting and comedy is that you can fit running round it," he said.

"Even in outer mongolia, you can say I'm off for a run. You don't need equipment. You don't need to take anything with you. It's perfect."

Not that he's giving up the day job. As soon as the running is over, he's back to filming in Los Angeles, a new stage show and the starring role in a new children's drama for the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú this Christmas.

In The Lost Christmas, commissioned by Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú One and CÂ鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú, he'll play an enigmatic character with the power to find the lost, who appears on the snowy streets of Manchester one Christmas Eve.

Before then - he has another street in his sights. Buchanan Street in Glasgow is where he'll pick up his marathon relay tomorrow.

"I used to perform there as a street entertainer so it's as good a place as any to start," he said.

"From there, it's Stirling, then Edinburgh."

Fans can keep up with his journey via Twitter.

Stéphane Denève, music director of the Royal Scottish National Opera (RSNO) has been doing his homework ahead of Friday's concert of Berlioz's Romèo et Juliette at Edinburgh's Usher Hall.

The orchestra's last performance at this year's festival also mark's the French conductor's first performance of his fellow countryman's dramatic symphony.

So on Tuesday, he was off to the National Library of Scotland to see a rare early presentation of the score.

The score - part of the Hopkinson Berlioz Collection, musical and literary works formed by the music bibliographer Cecil Hopkinson (1898-1977) - includes the composer's hand-penned markings and comments.

I'm told Mr Deneve found at least one deviation from his own modern score, which he was eager to correct.

Cecil Hopkinson - whose Berlioz bibliography, published by the Edinburgh Bibliographical Society in 1951, remains a standard work of reference - presented his extensive Berlioz collection to the National Library in 1952, but continued to add items to it after this date.

It includes editions of Berlioz's music, proof copies, and presentation copies with inscriptions by Berlioz.

It's described as the third greatest collection of Berlioz's legacy - and for one Frenchman far from home, it looks like being a very useful source.

So the Trust of - has thrown in the towel and called in the administrators.

Their claims that they could streamline the operation and raise further funds proving just too tough in the current climate.

Despite press speculation to the contrary, the building will remain open for the time being while its future is negotiated.

I understand at least 24 of the 57 staff have already been made redundant. It's unclear what will happen to the remaining staff and the current programme of events.

It's all a far cry from the big shiny building the Queen opened back in 1999 - the main structural legacy of Glasgow's reign as city of architecture.

It was, we were promised, a centre which would convince the ordinary man on the street that architecture and design were not just an essential part of his daily life, but something he should actively engage in.

A big promise and one, which for all the imaginative attempts of the various staff who tried, failed to really achieve that buzz.

Part of the problem was the location.

Despite having a prime city centre location, its entrance was down a dark lane, meaning neither the building or its entrance were clearly visible from the main drag.

Its Six Cities Design Festival failed to inspire the Government enough to commit funding to a second one.

The result was an overspend on staffing and planning, which combined with the cost of attending the Venice Bienalle, pushed the Lighthouse so far into the red that it had to ask for an emergency package last year.

The writing was on the wall from then as the board attempted to boost their commercial earnings - already a substantial achievement compared to other organisations - in the midst of a world wide recession.

What will happen next? Glasgow City Council may know.

They own the building, and if they can convince the administrators there's a viable way to keep it open with the focus on a business centre for the creative industries, The Lighthouse may live on.

The problem will be convincing councillors that - just as they prepare to launch two new revamped arts centres (Trongate 103 and the the new Tramway complex) that's there's scope for another.

And those who invested heavily in the original building - including the Lottery Fund - will want assurances that any new organisation will be open and accessible to as many people as possible.

Jonathan Mills' prediction that a theme of Enlightenment in this year's Edinburgh International Festival programme meant a parallel theme of endarkenment, proved uncannilly accurate at the weekend as a power cut at the Usher Hall plunged performers and audience into darkness.

The book festival was having similar problems on Friday night when the generator caused a blackout just as Ian Rankin took to the stage to announce the James Tait Black Memorial Prize.

Mr Rankin - no stranger to dark places, at least as far as his books go - gamely carried on with the announcement.

Torchlight presentations weren't required as by the time Sebastian Barry stepped forward to receive his prize for the wonderful Secret Scriptures, the power had been restored and the lights were back on in the main tent.

Acting book festival director Richard Holloway was reasonably relaxed and speculating wildly about where any additional power source could be placed in the tight-packed site.

Beneath Prince Albert's plinth? he asks with a wink.

Amidst the expected handful of cancellations and changes on Saturday is the news that former Sex Pistols manager Malcolm McLaren has pulled out of an event.

Not the shyest of flowers, it can hardly be because of the pressure - it appears he's had a fallout with the New York-based storytelling society The Moth, with whom he planned to appear.

Apparently, they wanted to cut back his story about how as a teenage wine taster he used sexual phrases to describe wine.

The book festival is playing down any fall-out.

They say he simply didn't have enough time to prepare his story.

Despite the intense content of his books, author David Peace turns out to be, in person, a softly spoken affable Yorkshireman who charms the surprisingly sparse audience in the main tent on Saturday night.

Having completed the acclaimed Yorkshire set Red Riding Quartet, while living in Japan, he admits he's now moving back to Yorkshire, meaning the third part of his new Tokyo trilogy will be written there.

Asked about how he moved between such eclectic subjects - the Yorkshire ripper, a Japanese serial killer, Brian Clough - he admitted it was a strange jump.

The Damned United, he said, had meant to be entirely focused on Leeds United but Clough's story dominated.

"In some ways," he admits,"it felt like a waste of a good book."

And fans can look forward to another Peace sporting life. He confirmed at the weekend that he intends to get under way shortly on a book about Geoffrey Boycott.

Meanwhile, book festival regulars have been paying tribute to departing festival director Catherine Lockerbie, who announced her decision to quit after nine years, just a few weeks before this year's festival began.

Among them poet laureate Carol Ann Duffy who penned an ode for the occasion.

INSIDE THE YURT
(for Catherine Lockerbie)

Inside the yurt was a pond where goldfish swam
and the poets fished for haiku, undisturbed
by the piper playing an old lament outside.
Inside the yurt was a parliament, the politicians
took off their masks at the door and lay down
with the truth, a dram, from where they watched
London Town floating away like a dream.
Inside the yurt was an elephant, a hump-backed whale,
a swarm of bees, a Vice-President of the USA
who had come to say enough was enough. Inside
the yurt was a mosque at dusk, the sound of a wholly
human voice. A novelist whizzed round and round
in the yurt in her red Ferrari. A scientist checked
his notes on the next tsunami. A polemicist helped himself
to a large red wine and salami. Inside the yurt
was a loch where the National Monster swam
and another dram... and another dram... and another dram...
Inside the yurt was a magic pen which signed the name
of someone who wasn't there. Inside the yurt was the key
to a prison cell; a candle burned. Inside the yurt
was a wishing-well, a gaelic spell, the Hogmanay bells,
a nine-year queue of children, women, men,
two million, then, all in the yurt in a singing ring
for Catherine, for Catherine, for Catherine,
who brought to the yurt the living, giving word
and the bells and the books and the candles. Thank her.

Carol Ann Duffy

Pity poor actors Keith Fleming and Gail Watson.

Not only do they have to fake some bumping and grinding on the bar of Edinburgh's Barony Bar as part of their performance Barflies.

But there's also the daunting prospect of Alan Rickman sitting right in the front row.

They seemed to take it in their stride though.

Another vintage performance from Scots theatre company Gridiron whose past work has been performed everywhere from a playground (Decky Does a Bronco) to the airport (Roam).

This time, they've acquired one of the capital's most impressively atmospheric bars, and returned its pre-smoking ban fug, for a riveting adaptation of three stories by American writer Charles Bukowski.

Fleming plays Bukowski's alter-ego Henry, a hard-bitten drunken writer, who rails at the world from the end of his bar stool.

Gail Wilson plays the string of women in his life, swapping roles as easily as she swings in and out of the doors of the pub.

It's funny, and dark and surreal - a fan tears out her heart and sends it spinning down the bar at one stage, Henry is reduced to a six inch figure by his domineering ex-wife - no ordinary night in the pub.

It doesn't glorify drink or drunkenness in any way.

If anything, those of us who ordered an alcoholic drink with our ticket (part of the admission price) find ourselves guiltily sipping as the central characters binge and belch and splash drinks over each other.

It's not an advert for a night in the pub - although the Barony is a lovely old example - but it is a great advert for the health of Scottish theatre on the Fringe this year.

In complete contrast to Faust, one show on the Edinburgh festival scene is as traditional as they come but every year sells out.

The Edinburgh Military Tattoo may seem like a show for the tourists - 70% of its customers come from abroad - but you can't argue with its success.

To a home-grown Scot, it can seem like military pomp by numbers.

Pipe bands. Tick.

Marching bands. Tick.

Flypast. Tick.

Namechecks for visitors from around the world. Tick, tick, tick.

Aside from filming at the dress rehearsals, when I spend much of my time preventing the camera crew getting hit on the head by low-flying drumsticks, it's been a number of years since I last watched the Tattoo.

But this festival, I returned.

True, I was seated in supreme comfort in one of the official boxes - a day later and I would have been right through the wall from the King of Tonga.

And aside from the uniforms, one band could easily segue into another (except for those who were keen to display some item of cultural stereotype, the Swiss for example with a great Alpen Horn and a bit of yodelling - some later Swiss performers proved a bit more avant garde by setting their drumsticks on fire and drumming with those).

But it's hard to escape that tingling, hair-raising feeling as the massed pipes and drums emerge from the shadows, the drone of the pipes building to the final chorus of Amazing Grace.

I defy anyone to not feel a few goosebumps over that.

On the subject of the Tattoo - best wishes to Tom Fleming - the TV voice of the Tattoo.

Tom has provided the voiceover for the television coverage for the last 44 tattoos.

Unfortunately, a hospital appointment this weekend means he's not going to make his 45th.

Radio Scotland's very own Ian Anderson is stepping in the breech for the show, which will be broadcast - to millions - on 29 August.

Good luck Tom - and haste ye back for your 46th tattoo!

It's hard not to be blown away by the Edinburgh International Festival's staging of Faust.

A production so huge, it has to be staged at the Lowland Hall in Ingliston, it leaves you after two and half hours of unrelenting spectacle, feeling slightly exhausted and a little overwhelmed.

From the chalk-faced students behind Victorian desks in a giant classroom full of newspaper, to the pig headed creatures in white coats and pulsating bodies moving in time to the sniggers of Mephistopheles, it's one visual feast after another.

The key moment - if slightly long in arriving - is the moment when the stage splits and the audience follows the performers into the jaws of hell.

Fire-eaters and pagan rites, bestiality and sensuality, writhing bodies carried aloft on forklift trucks, a woman covered in blood carries a pig's head through the space.

It's hard to know where to look next - as the live music from the band above thunders on.

But suddenly, we're being ushered back into our seats - and in very British style, everyone seems keen to sit back in their original seats - and it does break the tension.

That and the sur-titles - the show is in Romanian - which frequently clash with the spectacle and often seem a little clumsy in translation.

It's also hard to feel any empathy with Faust, portrayed by Ilie Gheorghe as a meddling, bumbling fool right from the start.

The seduction of Margareta - played here as a white ankle-socked schoolgirl - does little to gain ground.

But if Faust fails to win us over, Ofelia Popii as Mephistopheles steals the show.

Her amazing movement - crouching, creeping, leaping from the moment she emerges from a cupboard - and astonishing delivery, alternating between baby vocals and old hag growl - makes her the centre of attention, even in a show packed with over a hundred performers.

She's the worthy focus of the applause and part standing ovation at the end.

When we interviewed her earlier this week, she said she hoped audiences would be touched and moved by the piece - as well as blown away by the scale and spectacle of it.

I'm not sure this production by Theatre Radu Stanca of Sibu and director Silviu Puracete quite achieves that level of intimacy - but it was a brave and ambitious attempt and well worth the trip to Ingliston to see.

Faust is at the Lowland Hall, Ingliston until Saturday.

The Edinburgh International Festival has released an extra 30 tickets per night which are available from the Hub Box Office.

Hugely excited about the ideas Scots artists have come up with for the cultural Olympiad.

As I'm sure you all know, that's the strand of cultural activity running alongside, and leading up to, the 2012 London Olympics.

And while i'm not convinced all this cultural activity will achieve the aim of convincing us all that the Olympics aren't Londoncentric, sports-dominated (at the expense of everything else) and downright pricey, it has inspired some of our most talented artists to come up with some interesting sports inspired ideas.

Glasgow-based sculptor Kenny Hunter wants to commemorate modern Olympians in traditional Greek fashion.

Angus Farquar and NVA plan a people-fuelled art sculpture.

The Speed of Light would use hundreds of walkers on Arthur's Seat in Edinburgh to power a lighting system.

Kate Robertson has her sights set on 24 disused industrial chimneys, including the one at Tramway in Glasgow.

Tatham and O'Sullivan want to create four travelling sculptures which they'd take on tour round Scotland.

And Craig Coulthard has plans for a football pitch in woodlands which can only be seen from above. In a plane.

He plans for it to be used for one international game before allowing nature to reclaim the pitch.

Sadly, only one of the ideas will actually get the money to get off the drawing board with half a million pounds from the Scottish Arts Council Lottery Fund.

You can help shortlist your favourite by logging on for a look at

How do you miss a pink double decker bus?

Perhaps it was its late arrival, and thus, non-listing in the Fringe brochure which meant The Pink Bus failed to make our list of .

There have (of course!) been bus shows before but not this one, which is making its first appearance in Edinburgh.

Inside it contains half a car, a fireplace, a love corner with Mills and Boon wallpaper and a bar made of old cans and vinyl.

Performers who will be hopping on-board while it's parked at C Soco Urban Garden, include Paul Foot, Simon Munnery and Patrick Monaghan, Adam Hills and George Ryegold.

Not to mention music from the Banana Sessions - who are well used to transport related gigs, having last been spotted playing on the Glasgow Underground during the annual Subway festival.

With just 26 seats, it's one of the more intimate venues on the Fringe - so intimate in fact that Paul Foot invites all the family to pop on their pyjamas for siesta story time.

The bus was created by Victoria Brook and Caroline Fletcher who spent their final year at Art School making the Pink Bus from recycled material.

For a pound, members of the public can take a look around (between shows obviously as it's a big of a squash otherwise.)

The classroom rules start before we've even left the box office.

"Line up, and follow me, crocodile-style so I can make sure you are all safely across the road," says the steward cheerily.

The mainly grey-haired audience giggle.

We are back in school for a performance called Double Art History - literally behind desks in a classroom in Edinburgh University.

The premise of the show is that the school's regular art teacher has suffered a nervous breakdown and a supply teacher has arrived to give the class its final push for a history of art exam.

Its star Will Gompertz isn't a stand-up but a respected director of the Tate Gallery in London.

He went to comedy classes to boost his public speaking skills for lectures and decided to go the whole hog and put on a show at the Fringe.

It's not so much a show as a swift lecture on modern art, 27 art movement "isms" dispatched in less than an hour.

But there's plenty of humour - from the drawings of human body parts we all have to do when we first sit down - leading to icebreaking comments like "madam, could you show me your husband's penis?" to the silly hats and props which become an aide memoire for the various art movements through the whistle-stop tour.

From impressionism to post-impressionism to primitism, orphism, automatism and fluxus, he races through them all with slides of the artists and the artists involved.

Dadaism provokes the nearest Gompertz gets to a heckle.

His explanation that the movement, as championed by Duchamps and his urinal exhibit, changed the face of modern art forever by suggesting any everyday object could be art - since it was the concept, not the final artwork that mattered.

A man in the front row furrows his brow and raises his hand.

"But how do we know that it's a work of art, and not just someone having a joke at the art world's expense," he says.

"A very good question," says Gompertz, with barely a pause,"come and see me after class."

And there is genuinely a test at the end - 10 questions on the isms - which most of the class pass with flying colours (having muddled our fauvism with our cubism, we lagged slightly with 80%) before the class is dismissed and we leave, not just entertained, but genuinely having learned something new about modern art.

Double Art History is at Underbelly's Hullaballoo at 1750 BST.

It's not just comedy overshadowing other comedy at the festival. The Fringe is so big, it sometimes overshadows other festivals.

So it is worth flagging up the alternatives including the ever-expanding People's Festival.

Originally set up by Hamish Henderson as an alternative to the Edinburgh International Festival, which many felt in a few short years had begun to sideline homegrown work, it was revived again in 2002 and has been running annually ever since.

It's now not so much an alternative to the mainstream festivals - as an addition to them.

There's an exhibition of the history of the festival running alongside a new art show - Let the People Speak - in North Edinburgh Arts Centre.

There's also a show inside Saughton Prison - no jokes about captive audiences please - an Ian Rankin sponsored Rebus tour of the capital, a comedy night in association with The Stand, a guided walk round Radical Auld Reekie and an evening celebrating the protest songs of the people in St Leonards. Phew.

And Dr Fred Freeman - a celebrated authority on Hamish Henderson (he recently broadcast an hour-long documentary about Henderson on Radio Four) will deliver this year's Hamish Henderson Memorial Lecture.

More details from their website

This, according to Jason Byrne, is his 13th year on the Edinburgh Fringe but there's nothing unlucky about that.

At last night's sell out gig at the Assembly on the Mound, even the restricted-view seats were being snapped up and the show was half an hour late, while they tried to get everyone in their seats.

The show - the Byrne Supremacy - is very funny, mostly Byrne's varied observations on everything from his childhood foibles to his hatred of Disneyland.

It's witty and funny and the audience lap up every word.

No heckles here, and no danger that Byrne's going to lose his train of thought, even when he's sidetracked in conversation with members of the audience.

Byrne reports bumping into a man in Edinburgh who said "ah just bought a ticket for yer show, ye better be good then...."

But for most of the audience, this is a safe bet.

A guaranteed good night out in a festival full of choices.

Does it mean the comedy wing of the fringe has sold out?

I'm not so sure. For every comic like Ricky Gervais, who play to thousands on the castle esplanade, there's one like Stewart Lee who is staying loyal to the Stand, a venue he's sold out - but could have done many times over.

Many people will balance their one safe choice with something a bit more off the wall.

There's plenty of choice among the free fringe events which ensure your pocket doesn't take a hit, even if your sense of humour does.

And in fairness to people like Byrne, when he first started, he too would have been that unknown comic, relying on word of mouth rather than his radio show to sell tickets.

With the average stand up show costing £10,000 to stage, can you blame anyone trying to make some money?

The comedy sector has grown dramatically on the fringe - but the unique set up means that's not necessarily at the expense of any other sector.

There are just more shows - and hopefully room for everyone, whether that's established comics or avant garde theatre.

The Pleasance managed to rustle up not one but two TV children's TV presenters for the launch of their new Kidzone on Saturday morning.

The area - which has storytelling and music sessions as well as child-friendly snacks and lunches was set up in response to the number of parents who complained the Fringe offered plenty of kids shows but nowhere for them to go afterwards.

Cbeebies presenter Andy Day managed to reduce most of the under fives present to gibbering wrecks, while the mums and dads went weak at the knees for former Blue Peter presenter Peter Duncan.

While Andy has appeared at the Fringe before, it's a first for Peter Duncan, whose only previous Edinburgh experience was as Jim Hawkins in Treasure island at the international festival in 1991.

As well as appearing in his own show, Peter Duncan is launching his own campaign to keep the Blue Peter garden. (press reports suggest the garden will become a virtual one shortly)

He and his daughters set to work transforming a corner of the Pleasance into his own homage to the Blue Peter Garden, complete with gravestones for the high profile pets who died during his tenure.

Meanwhile, the - its city centre route abandoned because of the Tramworks.

From an audience point of view, it certainly worked better - plenty of high vantage points and none of the overcrowding we've seen in previous years.

Some performers will take convincing - a few groups dropped out and many of those who would normally walk the route had to restrict themselves to performing in the park at the end.

The weather held too - with the umbrellas serving a new purpose as parasols.

In lesser conditions, it probably wouldn't have had the same atmosphere at all and although no official numbers were available - it seemed to most onlookers that it was down dramatically from the figures of a 100,000 and more we've seen in previous years.

Talking of celebrity endorsement, one show can already claim a high profile reviewer, and before its show even opens in Edinburgh.

According to the cast of Porn the Musical - George Square Theatre from today - their show was seen by leading impressario Sir Cameron Mackintosh during their first run in Malta.

"He then sat down for a drink with the cast and crew to give his views on the show, which he thoroughly enjoyed," says my source in the cast.

All of which allowed the Malta edition of the Times to run the memorable headline "King of theatre watches Porn'"

As mentioned previously, nothing boosts a Fringe show like a celebrity endorsement.

But something tells me Madonna isn't going to give her blessing to .

The show is about the singer's attempts to adopt a little girl from the country, a sister for her first adopted child David Banda.

It's all a bit mad - African song and dance interspersed with reworkings of the singer's own songs (Like a Prayer is the big opening number).

Madonna is portrayed by a tall, Malawian man in a blonde wig who makes Madge look like a pussycat.

Performers wearing giant nappies and T-shirts proclaiming "adopt Me" simply add to the surreal experience.

But according to the cast, it's no more surreal than the experience of Madonna arriving in the first place.

"Half the people didn't know who she was," says Mishek Mzumara.

"She went to see one chief and he had to be shown her picture on a T-shirt to work out who she was."

One of the cast even lost his job because of the Madonna roadshow.

Shombi Bandi was appearing with a dance show at Kumbali Lodge Cultural Troupe when he met Madonna and worked with her.

When he was approached about the Edinburgh show, he couldn't resist giving a few snippets of gossip about her entourage, and was promptly sacked by the Lodge.

"I hope they'll give him his job back," says director Toby Gough,"especially if this show is a success. Madonna clearly instils a lot of fear in people in Malawi."

Behind the comedy, the show also considers the serious issue of whether Madonna, or indeed any wealthy Western person, ought to be able to adopt Malawian children so easily.

It's an issue which has divided the country and the cast of the show.

Since both Madonna's adopted children have family still in the country, many feel the singer should have stayed in Malawi and that the whole process was too hasty.

But others say the country must consider the wider picture of a country which has more than 1.5 million children in its orphanages.

During the show's Malawi run, audiences were encouraged to take part in an aftershow debate.

The plan is to poll audiences in Edinburgh as they leave.

At a mere six years old, the Edinburgh Art Festival is the youngest of the capital's festivals but it's giving the others a run for their money this year.

Fifty spaces had exhibitions opening on Wednesday, including Edinburgh Printmakers who have a show of new work by veteran artist Sir Peter Blake.

The young Turk of British pop art may be a white-bearded gentleman now but he's still heavily involved with the music scene which made his name.

"I still work with musicians. I've just done an album cover for the Blockheads, and I've just done a book with Brian Wilson about his album Lucky Old Son, which is his anthem to California and I did 12 images to illustrate that."

And dare we mention the Sergeant Pepper album? The iconic image which made his name but not his fortune (his gallery signed away the copyright while Sir Peter got a flat fee.)

According to colleagues, his mild demeanour turns sour when anyone mentions it.

He's kind but firm when I ask if he gets tired of being asked. "yes, i do", he responds.

"Recently, I've tried to talk about it, if it's essential. I've loosened up about it.

"There was a time when I just couldn't talk about it. My mouth went dry. I'd said the thing so often, I couldn't say them again.

"But it's a nice thing to have done - such an icon - that I can't not talk about it."

And there are clearly no bad feelings between him and the band who feature in at least one image in his diamond dust series.

But the artwork causing a stir in this show is his new image of Andy Warhol.

He recalls: "We never got on, we were both quite taciturn".

Just a day into the run, all prints have already sold out.

Sir Peter Blake is conventional in comparison to some of the things on offer at this year's Edinburgh Art Festival.

One of the most beautiful exhibits - but still frankly strange - is the Cybraphon at the new gallery Inspace.

Inspired by early 19th century mechanical bands such as the nickelodeon, the Cybraphon is an interactive version of a mechanical band in a box.

The robotic instruments respond to online comments.

When we visited the Cybraphon, it was underwhelmed, it's little needle pointing slightly towards despondency.

Its makers say they have installed precautions to ensure it doesn't go into complete melt-down if people say really mean things about it, which is always a possibility in the midst of festival season.

It's that time of year when the going gets tough and the tough get desperate. Even the most shameless self promoter will struggle to stay the centre of attention for any length of time in the midst of almost 35,000 performances.

This week is the traditional Week Zero - when venues get up and running - then come, Friday, it's the free for all as the Fringe officially gets underway.

So how to get some attention from the press in the midst of this cultural maelstrom? here are just some of the attempts i've witnessed over the years.

1: Send gifts. The more bizarre the better. We journalists like nothing better than opening a huge cardboard box full of polystyrene chips to discover a small plastic mouse. Or squashed Quality Street. Probably made sense to you but then you have been working in a mad frenzy to get your show ready for the festival and your brain is likely to be as squashed as the quality street.

One thoughtful company once sent a box containing foot gels and other soothing balms in a bid to persuade reviewers to attend their far flung venue. It failed although at least everyone's feet smelt nice.

2: Offer food - strange that anyone should think we hacks are swayed by a squashed Turkish delight in the post, or indeed a small boxed chocolate cake. A colleague once returned from a lengthy stay in the capital to discover a mouldy croissant and a small bottle of flat bucks fizz in her pigeon hole. It was apparently to mark a breakfast launch some weeks before. Timing is of the essence.

3: Show your best stuff in bite-sized chunks. Venues like to showcase excerpts of their best work. These showcases have now become as popular as many of the shows themselves - with countless civilians posing with notebooks, claiming to be critics from esteemed London journals. They also feed and water you well which makes them even more popular.

4: Get naked - if all else fails, take your clothes off. Not convinced that it will gain you any more than a cold, and a night in a police cell if you do it in a public place. Used to work when Edinburgh had its own answer to Mary Whitehouse - Councillor Moira Knox - to express outrage. Less impressive when everyone seems to do it all the time. Chippendales take note.

5: Get controversial. Threaten to smoke onstage despite the smoking ban - although even Mel Smith as Churchill didn't defy the law. Get blasphemous. Get banned. Just make sure someone notices - or your efforts will be entirely in vain. The problem with having so many shows is that moral crusaders can't get round them all - and if they don't bother, neither will the audiences.

6: Get put out of your venue. Whether through flooding, closure, or act of God, a sudden relocation of shows is always newsworthy. Reminds people of the "show must go on attitude" of those early fringe days, even if it's a completely manipulative business move.

7: Get robbed. Preferably of life-sized, hand carved puppets, cartoon costumes or silly hats. Get a sad appeal in the Evening News asking for their safe return and don't forget to mention the place and time of your show in passing.

8: Get lost. Also works for cast members, particularly small children and animal ones.

8: Get a celebrity. Denise Van Outen, Lionel Blair, Alisdair MacGowan will all be spotted doing mundane things around Edinburgh over the next few weeks. But even they will struggle to get a mention without resorting to one of the above. Denise Van Outen may attempt number four. Less advisable in Lionel Blair's case. All will be overshadowed by Peter Andre's arrival at the TV festival at the end of August. Everyone will want to see him shopping in Tesco Metro.

9: Get celebrity endorsement. Sean Connery was asked what his favourite film was at the 2007 Edinburgh International Film Festival. He said Black Watch, which apart from being a stage play at the Fringe, was also completely sold out anyway. Still nice to be able to run the tagline "as recommended by Sir Sean..." Kylie had a similar effect on sales of tickets for the Sri Lankan show she sponsored when she apparently "popped in".

10: Have a great show. The best and most honest way to gain press coverage. Word of mouth will spread quickly and before you know it you'll have people begging to get in.

And whether you're a publicity hungry promoter, an enthusiastic performer or a confused punter, have a great festival. Hopefully bring you the best bits - without the hype, the nakedness or the squashed sweets - here on the blog!

Glad i got my order in early for the long awaited DVD release of the television series Tutti Frutti.

A number of online retailers are already sold out of their initial supplies, perhaps taken aback by the demand.

Then again, this is a show which has taken 22 years to appear on anything other than a bootleg video, it has twice sold out screenings at the Glasgow Film Theatre and, according to cast and crew, even two decades on still results in at least one question a day about "whatever happened to Tutti Frutti?"

"Every day. every bloody day, someone asks, what happened to Tutti Frutti, even in the States, everywhere," says Robbie Coltrane, who starred as Danny McGlone.

The reason, according to the Â鶹¹ÙÍøÊ×Ò³Èë¿Ú, was that paperwork relating to the performance of Tutti Frutti was never submitted to Jerry Lewis's record company (pedants will recall Robbie Coltrane's character changes the words to "I've got a girl in love, she makes me sleep in the tub" - a reference to Emma Thompson's character Suzie Kettles).

"I've heard so many stories over the years," says the show's creator John Byrne.

"I heard that somebody lost the paperwork but there have been so many stories.

"A guy phoned up a few years ago and said there were plans to release it and i just said good luck, it never came to anything.

"So yes, i'm thrilled it has happened at last. I honestly didn't think it would ever see the light of day."

But after 22 years, will it be worth the wait?

On the strength of the first episode, I think it'll still live up to the hype.

The TV style is as old-fashioned as the 80s outfit, those lingering shots look so dated in contrast to today's swiftly edited fast paced shows.

But the script is as sharp and as funny as it was back in 1987, thanks in no small part to performers like Richard Wilson as Eddie Clockerty and Katy Murphy as the long suffering Ms Toner.

The screen chemistry between Robbie Coltrane and Emma Thompson can't be faked - they're clearly big pals - and their on-off, will they, won't they relationship is genuinely engaging.