The Edinburgh Festival Fringe is the world's largest performance arts festival, which in 2024 spanned 25 days and featured more than 51,446 scheduled performances of 3,317 different shows across 262 venues from 58 different countries. Of those shows, the largest section was comedy, representing almost 40% of shows, followed by theater, which was 26.6% of shows.
Henry James Naylor is a British comedy writer, director and performer. He is also a playwright.
Bard on the Beach is Western Canada's largest professional Shakespeare festival. The theatre festival runs annually from early June through September in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. The festival is produced by Bard on the Beach Theatre Society whose mandate is to provide Vancouver residents and tourists with affordable, accessible Shakespearean productions of the finest quality. In addition to the annual summer festival, the Society runs a number of year-round theatre education and training initiatives for both the artistic community and the general community at large. Bard on the Beach celebrated its 30th anniversary season in 2019.
Forbes (Robertson) Masson is a Scottish actor and writer. He is an Associate Artist with the Royal Shakespeare Company. He is best known for his roles in classical theatre, musicals, comedies, and appearances in London's West End. He is also known for his comedy partnership with Alan Cumming. Masson and Cumming wrote The High Life, a Scottish situation comedy in which they play the lead characters, Steve McCracken and Sebastian Flight. Characters McCracken and Flight were heavily based on Victor and Barry, famous Scottish comedy alter-egos of Masson and Cumming. Masson also stars in the 2021 film The Road Dance, set on the Isle of Lewis as the Reverend MacIver.
The Notre Dame Shakespeare Festival at the University of Notre Dame is an annual festival that seeks to combine professional productions of the works of William Shakespeare with community engagement and educational programs. The Notre Dame Shakespeare Festival is a part of the University of Notre Dame's Shakespeare initiative entitled "Shakespeare at Notre Dame", a program that recognizes the centrality of the study of Shakespeare in humanistic pedagogy at the University. Its fifteenth season was known as the 15/150, also celebrating the 450th birthday of William Shakespeare, and the 150th anniversary of the first full production of Shakespeare at the university in 1864. The anniversary season consisted of the Professional Company production of Henry IV, the Young Company performance of The Merry Wives of Windsor, and the annual ShakeScenes shows featuring actors of all ages from South Bend and the surrounding community.
Malachi Bogdanov is a theatre director.
Annabel Scholey is an English actress. She played Lauren Drake in the BBC supernatural drama Being Human (2009) and the leading role of 'Maddie' in the musical feature film Walking on Sunshine (2014). Scholey played Contessina de Medici in the television series, Medici: Masters of Florence (2016) with Dustin Hoffman and Richard Madden. In 2021, she played the major recurring role of Claire Brown in Doctor Who: Flux.
The Scottish Falsetto Sock Puppet Theatre is a comedy act that began in the United Kingdom in 2005 and has performed nationally and internationally since. They first appeared as part of The Sitcom Trials in London. They appeared in the Gilded Balloon at Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2018, 2019 and 2022 attracting highly positive reviews. The act has toured nationally and internationally every year since 2008 including Australia, Holland, Denmark and the Channel Isles. Prestigious appearances have included the Cheltenham Literary Festival and the Edinburgh International Magic Festival. They have appeared on BBC TV's The One Show, Comedy Shuffle, The Culture Show, Points West and Upstaged, GMTV, MTV, Current TV and Channel 4's Big Brother's Little Brother.
Shakespeare in the Park is a term for outdoor festivals featuring productions of William Shakespeare's plays. The term originated with the New York Shakespeare Festival in New York City's Central Park, originally created by Joseph Papp. This concept has been adapted by many theatre companies, and over time, this name has expanded to encompass outdoor theatre productions of the playwright's works performed all over the world.
Zinnie Harris FRSE is a British playwright, screenwriter and director currently living in Edinburgh. She has been commissioned and produced by the Royal Court Theatre, Royal National Theatre, the National Theatre of Scotland and the Royal Shakespeare Company. Her plays have been translated and performed in many countries across Europe and the globe.
Fourth Monkey Actor Training Company is both a repertory theatre company, and an actor training provider and drama school for young actors.
Our Ladies of Perpetual Succour is a play based on the 1998 novel The Sopranos by Alan Warner, adapted for the stage by Lee Hall. It received its world premiere at the Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh, in August 2015, before embarking on a short UK tour. The play is a co-production between the National Theatre of Scotland and Live Theatre. The production ran at London's National Theatre in August 2016 and was scheduled to transfer to the West End's Duke of York's Theatre in May 2017.
Guy Alexander Masterson is a British actor, writer, theatre director, producer and playwright widely known for his solo theatre performances of Under Milk Wood, Animal Farm, and Shylock by Gareth Armstrong. He is a regular producer at the annual Edinburgh Fringe Festival and responsible for several of its most notable productions including Twelve Angry Men in 2003, The Odd Couple in 2005 and Morecambe in 2009 – which transferred to London's West End and won a Laurence Olivier Award for Best Entertainment, and The Shark Is Broken in 2019 – which transferred to London's West End and won a Laurence Olivier Award nomination for Best New Comedy. It opened on Broadway on August 10, 2023 for a 16 week run.
Yaël Farber is a South African director and playwright.
Benjamin Hart is an English magician. In 2007, he was awarded the "Young Magician of the Year" award by The Magic Circle. Hart has worked on British television and is an inventor and designer of magic tricks and stage illusions. In 2014, he starred in Killer Magic on BBC Three. Hart was a finalist on Britain's Got Talent in 2019. He is a member of The Magic Circle (organisation)
Gbolahan Obisesan is a British Nigerian writer and director. He was the Artistic Director and Joint CEO at Brixton House theatre. He has served as a Genesis Fellow and Associate Director at the Young Vic.
John Emmet Tracy is an American-Canadian actor who has appeared in various film, television, and stage roles. He currently has a recurring role as Ellis Steele on the American television series, Yellowstone. He has previously held recurring roles on series like Batwoman and iZombie and was a series regular on the Syfy series, Olympus. Tracy has also appeared in films including American Mary (2012), If I Stay (2014), and Fifty Shades Freed (2018) and voiced the role of Thomas Jefferson in the video game Assassin's Creed III (2012).
Adura Onashile is a British actor, playwright, and director. She wrote and directed the 2013 play Expensive Shit and adapted it into a film in 2020.
Shaun Kitchener is an English stage and screen writer, and literary critic.
