I started the Edinburgh Fringe Festival this year with a five-show day, and enjoyed them all. Here’s a run-down:
Will Adamsdale: AI, AI, Oh… (or how I wrote a hit sitcom with ChatGPT but we’re not talking now) – 13:45 at Underbelly George Square, Bluebell
The title had me concerned that this could be another show in which a comedian reads AI-written material, in order to analyze the now-tired question of whether AI can do jokes. That might have been a mildly original premise in 2023, but isn’t something we need more of in 2026, so I was pleased to confirm that there is none of that in this show. Some conversations with ChatGPT appear, but don’t worry, none of them try to be funny.
Instead, the humour comes from Will Adamsdale’s compelling writing and stage presence. His persona is conversational but deceptively well in charge, as he held my attention rapt even in the most low-stakes parts of the story. He plays the warm and genial middle-aged man role in a way that reminds me of the patter of Gavin Osborn. He fills up the small space, figuratively and literally as he mines comedy from elements like where he stands and walks within the room (“room” – or, more accurately, shipping crate with some chairs and props).
The show tells a coherent story, sometimes non-linearly, but always easy to follow. He maintains multiple threads and throughlines that come back at just the right intervals so the audience doesn’t lose track of them. It’s clear that storytelling is Adamsdale’s background, as this is structured with more skill than your average stand-up show, even most narrative ones.
It’s low on big belly laughs, but delivers consistent mild-to-moderate laughs throughout the hour. Right through to the end, the story felt like it was going to build to something bigger, and it didn’t quite get there. But this fit into the overall themes, and I came away feeling like I’d had a satisfying experience all the same.
Tom Neenan: Portrait of Tom as a Young Neenan – 15:15 at Underbelly George Square, Bluebell
This was in the same room (shipping crate) just after Will Adamsdale, and they paired well together; I recommend the double header if you like watching middle aged men do skillful storytelling comedy. Neenan’s show was a bit looser with the narrative strands than Adamsdale, but also had some stronger jokes, so they average out to be similarly solid.
This show contains some physical comedy that works well every time; it opens with something that’s almost a sketch, and that’s so funny it made me wish there were more of it. It also has some scathing meta-comedy digs, some hilarious voices/impressions, and some absurd situations mined beautifully for the humour in them.
Some parts, like a routine about confectionary and efforts to draw the audience into it, felt a bit like padding. Other parts felt like they didn’t fit together as well as they could have, into the overarching narrative. But the meat of the show was all good, the laughs were very consistent, and its best jokes will stay with me for some time.
Amy Annette: Say What You Like About Me – 17:30 at Pleasance Dome, 10 Dome
This is Amy Annette’s third full hour, and while her first two were rightly considered strong work, this feels like show in which she has, as they say, found her voice. Annette has built her brand on relatable comedy, and she’s great at that – it makes her an excellent compere – but I believe she’s at her best when she’s talking very fast and passionately about niche subjects, and she let herself do that repeatedly in Say What You Like About Me, even while promising the audience that she’s going to stop.
This is more theatrical than her previous hours, with a PowerPoint presentation and an entire set worth of props on stage. These weren’t incorporated into the show as much as they could have been, but when they were, it was always effective. Well, it was effective when they functioned – the PowerPoint was plagued by technical difficulties, but she managed to bowl over those problems with the force of her sparkling personality, bringing up members of the audience to help, and riffing off the situation in ways that turned this problem into some of the biggest laughs of the night. This showed off her compering-honed ability to roll with the unexpected.
Say What You Like About Me is more political than Amy Annette’s previous shows, which is a positive thing, as it gives more opportunity for the niche-subject fast talking. She does a good job balancing straight-up jokes with heavier issue-tackling stuff, and her camp, charismatic persona carries us smoothly through even the roughest topics.
She uses a range of skills in this show, including (a bit of) her impressive singing voice, but she also does plenty of the Amy Annette bread and butter, which is insightful and funny analysis of the absurdity of feminine expectations. There’s an edge of anger that builds throughout the show, of a lifetime spent with this issue; it will be relatable to those who’ve lived it and eye-opening to those who haven’t. And yet, she’s so much fun that you’ll never come away feeling like anything got too dark.
Ali Brice: This Is the Way We Brush Our Teeth – 19:40 at Hoots Potterrow, Wee Container 1
Ali Brice is doing a crowd work-only show this year; after many years in a row of doing different types of character comedy and clowning, he’s grown tired of anything pre-written and is chasing the thrill of improv. Crowd work has a certain reputation these days, of made-for-social-media clippable content, so it’s fun to see crowd work from someone who could not be further from that type of comedian.
The humour in Brice’s crowd work comes from his absurd responses to whatever’s thrown at him, his ability to take any idea in an unexpected direction and walk there with the audience as though it’s completely natural. He invites us to be in on it, to follow his illogical logic and play off it as well, so building the show feels collaborative.
It’s a shame, then, that the night I saw it, this show was plagued by a made-for-social-media heckler, shouting rude things and intentionally messing up the momentum of Brice’s riffs. This is likely because I saw the show on a Saturday night, and the punter was audibly drunk.
Ali Brice dealt with it well; any comedian would be forgiven for asking security to remove that heckler, but Brice instead engaged him just enough to keep him satisfied, and to quell any worse interruptions. The rest of the audience was very much on Brice’s side, and in some ways it brought the crowd together and made everyone more determined to have fun with the show in spite of those issues. Overall, this was a fun time, and would probably be even more fun on a weeknight – luckily there are lots of those in August.
Lou Wall: Where Are All the Tall Grandmas? – 21:15 at Monkey Barrel 4
This is Lou Wall’s fourth stand-up hour, the third one I’ve seen live, and it lives up to the high standards I’ve come to expect from the Australian comedian. This has a slightly less breakneck pace than previous efforts, but still comes at you faster than the vast majority of shows you’ll see, at the Fringe or anywhere else. As Lou Wall fans will expect, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it jokes flash on the screen while Wall yells or sings their heart out. There are songs with lyrics so joke-dense that I know I didn’t catch them all in one go. There are props and surprises, there are laughs generated from the way Wall gestures and dances.
This show features a tone shift of the sort that I’ve not seen them do before – it felt jarring when it came in, but intentionally so, as that increases the impact of some genuinely shocking reveals.
This show is also very personal – it feels far more personal than their previous hours, somehow including the one from 2024 that centred around sexual assault – and Lou Wall seems a bit less sure of themself on that personal ground, than they do when rapping about printing off boarding passes at the library. The emotional parts aren’t as polished as the rest, but I found them quite effective anyway, and I hugely enjoyed this show all the way through.
There were a lot of big laughs in this one, which resonated all through the room; there was a great energy that was entirely curated by Lou Wall’s relentless and skillful energy. The writing is strong, the songs are catchy, the jokes are funny, and the subject matter hits hard.
Dave Baillie