For over a decade, Fleabag has been the Edinburgh Fringe success story held up as something for performers to aspire to.
This year, the festival returns fresh off the back of the success of Netflix‘s Baby Reindeer, one of the most talked about TV dramas of 2024 – it too plucked from the Fringe.
Whether many artists at the internationally-renowned arts event choose to admit it or not, the transition from stage to screen can be an unspoken lure.
Image: Fleabag was a Fringe show before it became a TV sensation. Pic: BBC
“Stand-up comedy is just blues without the music,” says comedian Reginald D Hunter of the tendency that’s been spawned for performers to perhaps overshare in order to get noticed.
“There’s this push to commoditize every aspect of yourself, but you got to keep a little bit of it.”
Hunter says it’s not only TV deals that newer comedians are on the lookout for.
“When I got started, people wanted to be on a sitcom or have their own TV show. Now it’s to have their own podcast.”
Andrew Maxwell has been playing to crowds at the Fringe for 30 years but in the last year he too has embraced the trend.
Image: Reginald D Hunter
Image: Andrew Maxwell
He now hosts the Eejits of the World podcast on YouTube alongside Canadian stand-up comedian Glenn Wool.
“It’s a different media landscape now, you can become globally famous from one TikTok,” he explains.
For newer acts, while he says there are now “many ways of leaping the barrier to success”, Maxwell believes a stint at the Fringe is still invaluable to “make you a whole lot better at your craft and what you do”.
New Zealand comedian Nic Sampson is one of the co-writers and performers in the BBC’s Starstruck, which was created by and stars another Fringe success story Rose Matafeo.
“I think the only reason any of us do this is to get the big TV deals,” he teases.
“Maybe some people are like that,” Sampson admits. “But you’ve got to enjoy performing to live audiences.”
Image: Nic Sampson
While some may be chasing a TV dream, entertaining expectant crowds night after night can be a little more brutal in reality.
Wrestling with ever-increasing costs, from the sky-high price of accommodation to worrying about what you’ll make back in ticket sales, there’s plenty for performers at Edinburgh Fringe to grapple with, including the spiralling pressure to stand out amongst the 3,300+ shows taking place.
Image: John Tothill went to an extreme length to find inspiration – and cash
‘I caught malaria to be here’
Performers including John Tothill are doing increasingly extreme things to fund their run.
In pursuit of money and material, the comedian signed up to a medical trial to be injected with a deadly disease – an experience he describes as like being “dragged to hell”.
“Malaria, we found out later, was hiding in my liver,” he explains.
“I will say it was good money, but it did not cover the cost of the festival. Even then, I was still in the red.”
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