Scotsman Fringe Awards

Kicking off with a powerful blast of good-time energy from the Creole Choir of Cuba, and featuring guest appearances from some of the most sought-after acts in town, this year's Scotsman Fringe Awards brought the festival to a close in style. To watch some selected highlights - including some emotional acceptance speeches - click on the YouTube links above.

Review of an imaginary musical

The cast of Showstopper!: The Improvised Musical asked our comedy critic Kate Copstick to write a review of an imaginary show, which they would then create from scratch. Unfortunately, she had to do it right after seeing Kim Noble. Here's what happened, in her own words...

Thursday am: I am putting the final touches to my review for Showstopper! I have to review a musical which does not exist, but one I'd like to see. I have written a storyline which I feel will resonate with an intelligent audience, being one where the vapid blonde soprano doesn't get the man. As a matter of fact the older, brunette with a voice not unlike Fischer Diskau at his height does.

Thursday 6.20pm: I arrive at Assembly to review Kim Noble's show Kim Noble Will Die.

7.20pm: I am in an alleyway beside Assembly, bereft of words, dizzy, on the brink of tears, thrilled and, for one of the very few times in my life, just wanting a hug.

7.35pm: Assembly Bar. The doyenne of Edinburgh PRs, Liz Smith, buys me a large Jaegermeister and sits while I stumble and stutter and gaze at my knuckles and attempt to describe the show adequately.

7.50pm: I am panicking because I cannot get any enthusiasm up for anything that isn't climbing Arthur's Seat with a bottle of something serious and gazing at the stars while I consider... stuff. But I have to get my West End Wendy frock on.

10pm: As I arrive at George Square Theatre the cast are warming up. I can feel my fillings loosen as I lurk at the back of the space. I am clutching my review. This is how it reads...

The show within a show is a classic conceit and in this wonderful new musical it is used to maximum effect. The first scene is absolutely electrifying – two bodies in the throes of passion – it is like opening of Frankie and Johnny in the Claire de Lune adapted by Kander and Ebb. Or indeed the opening of Steven Sondheim’s Passion- but without the unintentional comic effect of Michael Ball trying to look heterosexual.

I really don’t know how the two had enough breath left to sing. But somehow they did. The onstage chorusline of voyeurs is a clever nuance and the Fosse-esque choreography enhances the scene like amyl nitrate enhances a quickie. Only then do we discover that this is only a rehearsal. A young and unfeasibly good-looking musical theatre company from Newcastle is bringing their make-or-break production to the Edinburgh Festival. Everything hinges on a success here. You can smell their desperation. “Oh God we need five stars,” they sing “We really need five stars.” The quasi-documentary style of the piece is something wholly new to musical theatre. Their production of Do I Hear A Little Night Passion As We Roll Along or Am I Losing My Mind opens tonight and the most feared critic in Edinburgh is coming to review.

She is a chain-smoking hard drinking woman – a hardcore version of Anne Bancroft in The Graduate with a voice like Elaine Stritch on steroids. The director of the show – a man so camp he has to have guy ropes to hold him down in a high wind – will not see his production fall victim to an embittered old crone and despatches his leading man – a young stud, of striking physical beauty and prowess – to ‘take one for the team’ (one of the most moving songs in the show) and get the critic onside. As it were.

The young man’s on and offstage lover – a stunningly beautiful, young blonde soprano with a vocal range of three octaves and an emotional range of f*** all is, of course, devastated. But somehow, we just don’t care. The young man and the critic meet in another electric scene and the growing passion between the two is the heart of this terrific little show. Musically, the scene where the entire cast are on-stage singing a complex ensemble piece while the young man sings a counter-duet with the critic in the audience is the high point. In many ways reminiscent of Traviata Act 2 Scene 2 – and I have no greater praise than that. The love affair is, of course, doomed to failure. The critic doesn’t want a plaything. The revelation that all she really wants is to be in a musical results in the shows brilliant closing scene – a glorious affirmation that dreams can come true.

10.25pm: I decide that lipstick would be more showbizzy so I disappear to the loos to apply some Stayfast. My lips are now an alarming shade of scarlet and, should the bomb drop tonight, would be the only things except cockroaches and Jonathan Ross's ego to survive.

10.50pm: The show starts. I notice my chest is blushing a reather unattractive shade of puce. That happens when I am nervous. But my review gets laughs. Dangerous. I begin to consider a return to performing. The cast is unbelievably good. Brilliant, in fact. My musical unfolds and it is beyond my wildest expectations. I start to think they must have had prior notice of the plot and the numbers.

Then I remember I wrote the outline and I have shown no one a thing. I am having the time of my life. And actually get applauded for something that an awesomely talented cast have done. I accept the applause.

Midnight: I am penning a five star review ... words like talent, incredible, hilarious, unbelievable, stunning, litter the page along with Queen, bald, Jennifer Aniston, Geordie and steroids. I think of adding 'don't miss this show', but realise you already have. So I add, don't miss seeing Showstoppers ! You really mustn't.

2am Go to sleep dreaming of being in a musical with Kim Noble ...

Showstopper! The Improvised Musical is at Musical Theatre @ George Square, 10:50pm, until tomorrow.

Always pleased with a piece of cheese

Q: What's the first thing Lucy Porter does when she arrives in Edinburgh for the Fringe?
A: Makes a beeline for Mellis's cheese shop to pick up some stinky brie.
To find out more about Lucy's addiction to premium-quality dairy products, click on the YouTube link above.

The miraculous comedy powers of Brendon Burns

These days he's one of the biggest names on the Fringe, but not so very long ago Brendon Burns was playing the back room of an Edinburgh pub, using a sound system that broke down every time he raised his voice. The turning point in his career? A summer at the Pleasance King Dome where, as well as cementing his reputation as a comedy A-lister, he miraculously cured a cripple through the power of laughter. To find out more, click on the YouTube link above.

Shappi's secret garden

Shappi Khorsandi's favourite place in Edinburgh? The garden at Mansfield Traquair, at the bottom of Broughton Street. To find out why, click on the YouTube link above.

The joy of junk

Aindrias de Staic, today's When in Edinburgh interviewee, loves nothing more than scouring the city's junk shops for musical instruments to use in his shows. To read about his long-standing love affair with Le Chariot Express on South Clerk Street, click here. So watch him in action, in a clip from a forthcoming documentary from Merchant's Gate Films, click the YouTube link above.

Hello Jack Vettriano

In terms of commercial clout and international popularity, Jack Vettriano is Scotland's most successful living artist by a considerable margin - his prints sell in such huge quantities that he reportedly earns £500,000 a year in royalties alone. Yet for reasons best known to themselves, officials at the National Galleries of Scotland (NGS) still refuse to exhibit his work. Vettriano has railed against this state of affairs for years, but to no avail. As far as the NGS are concerned, it seems his work simply doesn't cut the mustard.

It was a historic moment, then, when Edinburgh band St Jude's Infirmary cheekily unveiled a Vettriano painting at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery on Saturday night, at the launch party for their outstanding new album, This Has Been The Death of Us. The gig was the latest in a series of live music performances taking place this month, as part of the groundbreaking street art exhibition Rough Cut Nation (www.roughcutnation.co.uk).

Resting on an easel to the right of a makeshift stage, Vettriano's moody self-portrait was only on display for about an hour, while St Jude's performed a mixture of old favourites and material for their new record. But the point had been made: Jack had finally entered the building, albeit via the back door.

The painting, which appears on the cover of the new St Jude's album, is entitled Marked Heart, and shows Vettriano standing against a dark background with one arm outstretched.

"He looks like he's about to slit his wrists listening to a St Jude's track," joked the band's guitarist Grant Campbell after the gig.

Vettriano and St Jude's have admired each other's work for some time now. The group first caught Vettriano's attention in 2006, when they sent him a recording of their song Goodbye Jack Vettriano, the lyrics to which Campbell wrote when he was feeling homesick in a bar in Rotterdam and saw a Vettriano print on the wall.

St Jude's asked the artist if he would appear in a video they were making for BBC Scotland's The Music Show and he agreed, telling The Scotsman at the time: "It's a really brilliant song... it's all about the pain we feel falling in and out of love."

Along with crime writer Ian Rankin, another St Jude's fan, Vettriano has lent his thick, treacly vocals to a number of spoken word interludes on the new album. The band's singer and guitarist, Mark Francis, says he sounds "like a very Fife God".

And although he couldn't be in Edinburgh on Saturday to see his work finally make it into the Portrait Gallery, Vettriano was apparently aware that St Jude's were planning the stunt and gave them his blessing.

To watch an interview with Grant Campbell and Mark Francis, and to watch St Jude's Infirmary performing Goodbye Jack Vettriano live at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, click on the YouTube link above.

Stand-ups take over Fringe Firsts

Comedians were everywhere at this week's Fringe Firsts ceremony, with Rhona Cameron helping our chief theatre critic Joyce McMillan hand out the awards and stand-ups Mark Watson and Daniel Kitson among the second week's list of winners. Watson's acceptance speech, in particular, was a gem. Click the YouTube links above to watch all the action.

Rain stops play

Pappy's Fun Club and The Penny Dreadfuls are two of the most successful sketch comedy troupes to grace the Fringe in recent years, and on the surface they’re best of friends: they hang out at gigs together, they go drinking together – heck, they even go over to each other’s houses to play video games together. Probe this thin veneer of bonhomie, however, and you’ll find a fierce competitive spirit lurking just beneath.

Earlier this week, the Pappy’s v Pennies rivalry spilled over onto the cricket pitch – a contest that would give one troupe bragging rights over the other for the rest of the Fringe. To watch our film of the encounter, click on the YouTube link above. Read more about what happened here.

Power trip

EVEN if you're stone cold sober, walking around the Power Plant installation at Edinburgh's Royal Botanic Garden feels like some mad, psychedelic acid trip. Glowing, robotic insects chatter in the foliage and dance in the trees, ripped-up second-hand dresses float around the lily ponds like wraiths and a giant outdoor organ spouts balls of flame into the air from the tips of its pipes. To watch our film of the installation, click on the YouTube link above.

A puppet bares his soul

Since his wife left him and his promising showbiz career went into an alcohol-fuelled tailspin, Randy the Puppet hasn't given a single interview, so we were honoured when he agreed to talk exclusively to The Scotsman at his favourite Edinburgh watering hole, the Greyfriars Bobby bar. After a spell in rehab, the fallen star is attempting to relaunch his career at this year's Fringe with a confessional solo show, Randy's Postcards from Purgatory, at the Underbelly until 30 August. The reviews have been largely positive but, as we discovered, he's still got a bit of a problem with the demon drink...

Mark Watson's 24 hour show: the edited highlights

Couldn't get a ticket for Mark Watson's sold-out last ever 24-hour show? Don't despair: our friends at Sherwood Films went along to capture the action. By the time the film crew arrived at the Pleasance Dome, things were already hotting up. The day-long laugh-in kicked off 20 minutes late, so Watson decided the time should be changed all over Scotland to restore the natural order of things. To this end, he dispatched fellow comic Sammy J to Edinburgh Airport to inform passengers and officials of the change (wearing 50 items of clothing donated by members of the audience, just in case they didn't take him seriously). To find out what happened next, click on the YouTube link above.