Edinburgh Fringe 2024 Review – Is the Fringe a woke, unfunny, playground for upper-middle class Londoners? Our thoughts on our experience in 2024

The Edinburgh Fringe Festival is still the largest gathering of arts and culture on earth, only surpassed by the Olympics & the World Cup. This year, the year of 2024, the Fringe festival was home to 51,446 organised and scheduled performances, 3,317 shows staged in 262 venues - with artists coming from over 58 different countries (data is here).

This does not include informal acts (like street performances) or the hundreds of thousands of visitors who come from across the globe to catch free shows from amateur performers, each hoping, to catch the eye of a promoter and comedy heavy-weights.

Why then, is the Fringe quickly gathering a reputation for being disappointing, lack-lusture and an inconvenience to Edinburgh locals?

We spent the whole month in Edinburgh this year with the intention to write a review and to see whether the critisims match with our experience this year.

Context

Despite the reviews and articles published online, Edinburgh locals are usually the ones who experience the swell of the cities population and feel the atmosphere first hand: and many have been left wondering if it is all worth it.

There is a saying in Edinburgh among locals, that the Fringe is always subject to the "August Moan". Partakers in this yearly moan are mostly online locals who resent the increase in population, and disruption caused by the city. For balance, it is worth pointing out that there is a stark majority of locals who enjoy the festival atmosphere, welcome tourists of all kinds and are happy to sacrifice the delay in public transport for the month.

More widely, a growing critique of the fridge is that it is woke, unfunny, and censorious: promoting those with the 'correct' ideas and, therefore, limiting free speech. That is a playground of wealthy middle-class London art students, and becoming less of a place for 'up and coming' comics and writers to be spotted, but a jolly for the chattering classes. Finally, the city is overburdened by visitors that the city infrastructure cannot support.

Let us take each point and see how our experience in 2024 matches with these critiques.

Woke, Unfunny & Censorious.

Although the Fringe has always been accused of being Woke, Unfunny and Censorious, last year's Fringe seemed to be the pinnacle of culture wars.

It seemed, at least at the time, that the Fringe filled the media's front pages with allegations of censorship - acts like Jerry Sadowitz (show cancelled), Graham Linehan (forced from 2 venues, and eventually performed outside the Parlement) and Joanna Cherry (who's venue, The Stand, pulled out and later reinstated the show with extra security in preparation for violent protests) all had their fair share of media coverage.

Last year Fringe festival sparked a conversation about the ability to take risks in comedy, and limits to freedom of expression; each makes up the bedrock of comedy and art. Many critics suggested that those behind the feeling of censorship are the event organisers and club owners (such as Tommy Shepard) who are ideologically driven, and have undue influence on the types of acts playing at venues, and whose views are shared. Many, such as Leo Kearse (who published a view 7 years referencing a climate of anti-comedy), Konsintin Kisim and Frances Foster expressed reluctance to even attend the Fringe.

This year has seen significantly fewer newsworthy controversial comedy acts. The only cancellation was Reginald D Hunters - apparently poor - "Fluffy, Fluffy Beavers" after the alleged 'Baying' and 'Goading' of Israeli audience members. Later coined 'The Ugliest Fringe moment... ever seen" by Dominic Cavendish, in the Telegraph.

There is a conflict in the narrative as to who is in the wrong, but it is hard to argue  - at least outside tribal political terms - that a show being cancelled, due to what seemed like (collective) racially motivated abuse towards audience members, is the same as cancelling for having politically controversial opinions.

We watched plenty of shows in a range of venues hosted by The Stand and Just the Tonic. Everything from finished hour sets to new comics & 'work in progress' sets. Across the board, the comedy was unusually lack-lusture. You always expect strange and wonderful acts to be on the bills but much of the comedy we saw crossed no new ground- with very few belly laughs or confused hysteria recounting absurdities over a drink after the show. The mixed-act shows at The Stand were particularly disappointingly lacking in genuine laughter.

A number that we thoroughly enjoyed: From the wild, wacky but fantastically entertaining The Octopus, The Universe & Stuff by Cheekykita and Finn Taylor: Ask Your Mother.

A key theme that cut across all of the comedy we saw felt like there was indeed an atmosphere where 'taking risks' was not encouraged. A lot of jokes ran along the grain, rather than looking for the laugh. This is fantastic if you want to clap along or not in agreement (something which forms the basis of such acts as Nich Kumar) but not if you're looking for a laugh.

There could also be another explanation for this, many of the newer acts came from being tik-tok comics and trending personalities - many of whom were from upper-middle class London Suburbs.

Playground of wealthy middle-class London art students.

Yes, this has always been the case. But looking around this year the prevailing theme of most of the acts for 'Free Edinburgh' are of a certain demographic. The evidence for this is the eyes and ears of the person writing this. It is a fantastic pastime to sit and watch the world go buy at the fringe. To collect flyers, talk to the acts and watch them pitch their act to other potential audience members.

It seemed increasingly as though the "free" and "informal" Fringe is scattered with acts funded by arts councils, Oxbridge/ London Universities and the bank of Mum and Dad.

This has long been an accusation that the fringe is slowly replacing working-class acts with upper-middle-class students with deep pockets, or funded by University arts funds. In 2019, Kevin Gilday raised his concerns with others. The accusations have been long-standing that the Fringe is often a zero-sum game for ambitious acts, yet still pretend to support the "grass roots" comedy scene while ensuring that it is impossible to make money there (and using it to greedily profiteer from acts trying to make a name for themselves).

It's only value is as a stomping ground for the already successful headliners, and those who are lucky enough to have been spotted and given a golden ticket by an influential journalist or comedy writer. It seems the goal is to become the next Richard Gadd - but having watched Baby Reindeer, it is hard to argue whether the cost is still greater than the bounty. So it begs the question: is it still worth it for working-class and aspiring comics anymore?

An act we sat at the back for was the up-and-coming act Lucas Jefcoate who was working out his show "Will he, won't he, can't he"  in the iconic, The Caves. In his act, he had the foresight to pull themes from his upbringing, and the fact that he is "one of those posh comics" with a Tory mum. To give Lucas credit, while his show was a work in progress, he was funny, likeable and entertaining - self-awareness was key to his likability. What it does show, however, is that Lucas is now the model of the act of, and audience for, the Edinburgh Fringe.

The result is that those who cannot afford to spend the money to perform at the fringe find alternative sources for success. Social media has democratised comedy, and there is much more success to be had online. Is it true that if you're tallented, you don't need to be at the fringe? It has sadly resulted in the Fringe becoming less funny, less innovative and more expensive for punters. It could be argued, that this new audience is bringing their luxuary beliefs that further enforces the acusation of the fringe being woke, unfunny and censorious.

The value the festival rests upon is: to give anyone a stage and everyone a seat. On this, it did not deliver.

Regardless, as expected the festival did pull numbers. Millions in fact.

The City Cannot Cope

Thankfully, this year, it seemed as though the Fringe was quieter than it had been in previous years. That is not to say it wasn't unbelievably busy, but just less busy than in previous years. It was, therefore, surprising to learn that ticket sales had increased from 2.4 million in 2023 to 2.6 million in 2024.

Previous years were most memorable - and severely worsened - by bin strikes. The city smelled foul in the warm, humid, afternoons (worse in the warm, humid rain) and became infested with rats (for months afterwards). Piles of rubbish, almost 4m high, towered over the Grassmarket and bins overflowed into the paths. Even during the cleaner years, it is also very easy to find a disgruntled Edinburgh local who will happily take an hour from their day to contribute to the "August Moan".

It is true that public transport struggles. There are regular delays for busses that get caught in the busy traffic in town, they are often packed wall-to-wall with people and an uncomfortable experience that makes you think it would be better to walk. That would be true if the paths weren't dangerously busy. The added annoyance of being flyered every 30 seconds could easily see a commuter fly into an rage.

This year, thankfully the industrial action was prevented, although, at the busiest time of the year, the bins are regularly too full. The city was still swarming with people, but to our minds, added to the feeling of festivities and activity. There was excitement, happiness and always somewhere to go, and something to do. Perhaps he had learned better from last year and did not find ourselves crammed into the busy stairwell of the 3 sisters.

Some residents suggest "it's only a month" - and -"you should enjoy yourself, rather than moaning about it". For this this year at least, we would agree with that.

Final thoughts

As a final review of the 2024 Edinburgh Fringe, we have come to the following conclusion:

The acts, comedy and organised events lacked something this year. It felt flat, stagnant and - dare it be said - boring. It is hard to come to a firm conclusion whether this could be explained by the fact that the event has become associated with woke politics and censorship, and has restricted comics from taking chances -or even coming at all -  or it has more to do with the changed demographic of those who can afford to put on a show. Whatever may be the cause, our experience was flatter than previous years.

Where the Fringe shone this year was in the informal settings, surrounding the main events. The pubs, restaurants and music venues are packed for the whole month, and the city is filled with a festival atmosphere akin to a much larger capital city. This, however, has always been true for the Fringe.

Thankfully too, the state of the city was much improved.