Edinburgh Festival is in ruins – but there’s one gem amid the rubble

The virus has broken Edinburgh. The shattered remnants of the festival are visible on the internet. Here’s what happened. The international festival has been reduced to one filmed theatre commission and a handful of videoed musical offerings. The Fringe has survived but in a horribly mutilated form. Two of its most prestigious brands, the Pleasance and the Assembly Rooms (which host hundreds of shows between them every year), have pulled out entirely. They’re so well established that they’ll have no difficulty restarting in 12 months’ time. Another big name, the Gilded Balloon, is offering a few online shows and some recorded highlights from previous years.

Lesser-known outfits such as the-SpaceUK and Just the Tonic have mounted a large presence on the internet because they want to build up some goodwill and encourage this year’s performers to hire their rooms for August 2021. There’s no altruism in any of this. It’s not art for art’s sake. Just cash. Edinburgh venues are highly profitable businesses, which are run with the ruthless efficiency of shopping centres or bowling alleys.

Normally the Fringe offers about 3,500 shows. This year only a few hundred performers are ‘coming to your living room in August’, as the website puts it. Most are free. The collapse in numbers has led to a rise in amateurism. Many performers seem to believe that a decent show can be recorded on a cheap webcam perched in a corner of the kitchen. Viewers need to be patient and persistent to find content that’s audible and properly lit. Glitch is a two-hander about an angry man whose girlfriend was accidentally killed by a car driven by a female robot. The robot (confusingly dressed as the dead girlfriend) meets the man to discuss the tragedy.