The Edinburgh Festival Fringe is the world's largest arts and media festival, which in 2018 spanned 25 days and featured more than 55,000 performances of 3,548 different shows in 317 venues. Established in 1947 as an alternative to the Edinburgh International Festival, it takes place in Edinburgh every August. The Edinburgh Festival Fringe has become a world-leading celebration of arts and culture, surpassed only by the Olympics and the World Cup in terms of global ticketed events. As an event it "has done more to place Edinburgh in the forefront of world cities than anything else" according to its historian and former chairman of the board, Michael Dale.
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. Forbes also stars in the 2021 film The Road Dance, set on The Isle of Lewis as the Reverend MacIver.
The National Theatre of Scotland, established in 2006, is the national theatre company of Scotland. The company has no theatre building of its own; instead it tours work to theatres, village halls, schools and site-specific locations, both at home and internationally.
Matthew Earnest is an American theater director. He has also written plays, as well as adapted plays from novels, non-fiction books, short stories, and essays, and he has translated works in other languages for his direction.
Malachi Bogdanov is a theatre director.
The White Bear Theatre is a fringe theatre founded in 1988 at the White Bear pub in Kennington, London, and run by Artistic Director and founder Michael Kingsbury. It is one of London's leading pub theatres, as well as one of the longest established, dedicated since inception to both new writing and to its Lost Classics Project, which focuses on productions of obscure historical works. Notable theatre practitioners who have worked at The White Bear include Joe Penhall, Dennis Kelly, Mark Little, Emily Watson, Tamzin Outhwaite, Kwame Kwei-Armah, Vicky Featherstone, Torben Betts, Lucinda Coxon, Adam Spreadbury-Maher, and Brice Stratford.
Allison McKenzie is a Scottish TMA Awards nominated actress from Glasgow. As a youngster she went to The Mitchell Theatre for Youth and discovered her love of acting. She started her acting training at Langside College Glasgow & then went on to do a 3-year BA Acting degree at Queen Margaret University Edinburgh.She fulfilled a childhood ambition when she worked with the Royal Shakespeare Company in their 2016/2017 season at Swan Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon.
The Pantaloons are an English touring theatre company specialising in open-air productions of the plays of William Shakespeare. Their work draws from a wide variety of popular theatre traditions, and is often performed for free in public spaces.
Jethro Compton is a British writer, director and theatre producer. He was educated at the University of York between 2006 and 2009 in English Literature. His most notable production to date has been the world première of The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance .
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 work is translated and performed in many countries.
The Porters of Hellsgate Theatre Co. is a Los Angeles-based classical theatre company that was founded in 2006 by Edward Castuera, Jack Leahy and Charles Pasternak. It is a member organization of the LA Stage Alliance. The Porters are working their way through the works of Shakespeare, with the goal of becoming the first theatre company in the city of Los Angeles to perform the entire Shakespearean canon. In addition to classical pieces, the company also occasionally takes on new works, often written or translated by company members.
Shekinah Jacob (Chennai) is an Indian playwright based in Bangalore.
Deirdre Mullins is an Irish actress, director and activist. In 2017, she won a Scottish BAFTA for Best Actress in Film for her role in The Dark Mile.
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.
Richard Gadd is a Scottish writer, actor and comedian.
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.
Ben Humphrey is an English actor, director, writer, lecturer and criminal court Magistrate. He graduated from Bristol Old Vic Theatre School in 2007 and is also an associate of LAMDA.
