Here is the place to write a Show Report for your venue, detailing as much information as you can that might help shows there in years to come. Include things such as dimensions of stage, passing traffic, good spots to flyer, useful promo, tech equipment, ambient noise; anything that will help give shows a good idea of the venue before they arrive. **Please include your show number so we can confirm your show report is in the right venue forum**
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Show 267 Impro Poet Presents : What If History? 5th 16 in. 71.50 bucket. (20 to flyerer) 6th 26 in 71.00. 7th 10 in 38 8th 10 in. 30. 9th 21 in 80 10th 17 in 60 11th 23 in 60 12th 10 in 50 13th 33 in 120 14th 20 in 55 15th 35 in 140 Subtotal 755 ish Total audience 221 Average 221/11=20.09 Lovely Venue though required a committed audience as little through traffic. Main sources of audience were th Fringe App and the Wee Blue Book. Staff were fantastic and very accomodating.
- Best flyering was just outside the venue on Lothoan Road, though not much footfall, however no competition. Best change to the pre show was having a show Title with three buzz words to attract searches on line "impro" "poet" and "History" The show attracted just the right niche and a lot of kids wanted to see the history so very quickly became family friendly (only one rude joke anyway and that was in sign language)
Show report for One Eyed Scouts show 83 (Improv Comedy) 2.35pm daily 8 days We enjoyed performing at this venue. Room in the back of a pub. Noise of sirens from the road outside could be loud though the windows at times but generally outside noise was OK. Table of flyers outside the room often seemed to have people browsing and flyers to people near to the venue piqued interest. Enough stage space for 4 of us to perform comfortably. Audience numbers varied 2 - 14. Tables for audience to rest their drinks. Generally a good atmosphere. Tech wise we didn't need much other than connecting to the Bluetooth speaker which worked well.
Absolute Onions: Improv Comedy - show 88. 21-27 August. 19:15 The venue manager and Brewdog staff were excellent, very friendly and helpful. Our venue captain was great, also. Setting up a group chat for communication and being supportive by seeing everyone's shows in person. This is the 2nd year in a row, and 3rd year in total, that we have had a show at this venue. In all cases it has been a struggle to flyer and get people in the door, due to the venue location. Most people passing are either at work, on lunch or on their way to something else and not interested in free fringe shows. We've found that in the past, people have found us via the WBB or fringe website, looking for improv shows, however this was less this year, possibly because the app search function only showed shows that began with Improv, rather than having that somewhere in the title. Because of this, we only had 1 member in the audience at the start of out first show (they were later joined by a group of 4 who came in after the start) Friday and Saturday's audience numbers were good (we filled the room), but this was mostly due to making an effort into getting people in from the bar. They were not necessarily at the venue to see fringe shows. As mention by other shows, the traffic noise can be very distracting, especially as ambulances pass quite often, also the lack of blinds in the room reduces the theatrical atmosphere. Most other acts were very supportive to other shows too, so that was a huge plus. It makes the fact the act before us did not clear the room after they were finished and did not stay after their show to make sure we were happy with the room even more disappointing. Overall, an excellent venue captain and helpful staff made this a very enjoyable fringe.
The Venue Captain was GREAT, as were the staff. We found that the sports matches right next to us were really loud, and there was a fair bit of outside noise bleeding into the room. the sports matches particularly were hard to fight against. Oddly though, as an audience member for other people's shows I didn't notice the sounds from the bar at all. I think you hear it more from the stage than the audience space. We did enjoy the space and found it a friendly space. When people did come in it was a receptive audience. Our 7 shows had between 3 and 11 in. Due to one of us battling a chronic illness and us only being two, we relied on the WBB instead of flyering so we were happy people turned up. I'd say our audience were people from the WBB, people who knew of us and people who had no idea what they were coming into see. Which was a lot of fun. We loved the collective feeling of the venue, the WhatsApp group was set up in great time and a vital resource. We tried to find as many other shows at the event as possible and one of the best parts was connecting with other acts before and after our show. One day I just came at 11 am and sat and saw the next 4 shows, I felt really lucky to see such a breadth of talent. Interestingly the venue was listed as non accessible on the Fringe APP but had a working lift.
may as well finally get this done Show report for Bristol Improv presents: Ad-Lib Academy (13:25-14:10, 20th-27th August) As others have said, the venue captain was great and a good community vibe between the various performers at the venue was definitely established which definitely helped the run go well. We had issues getting flyers at the start so we relied a lot on the early days of getting friends of us living around Edinburgh and people at the venue in to performances and even when we got flyers we largely flyered outside the venue as opposed to the Mile - we did try some Mile flyering which managed to get a few people in but it was hardly the main source of audience members. The run was fairly successful - our lowest attendance was six people and our highest attendance was around twenty people. We also took in around 270 in donations from audience members in total and both of these are a significant improvement on last year's figures. The room itself was perfectly fine for our needs and I don't really have any comments - it works very well for student improv as a room.
Wow, check out CJ with the diligent statistics! I don't have that. Show #19 - Palindrome Fight! Crowds varied wildly -- not as many as CJ, but then I wasn't relentlessly flyering, in part because I had two shows and no flyerers. Niche show, I did find the venue a bit hard to drive traffic to. Management of the venue was fantastic, especially Jacob, Dave W was a rock star as venue coordinator, and lovely supportive venue mates. The TV worked great for A/V needs.
Report for Mission Magician 10.15 5 days. The venue captain was so amazing and often bumped into them. Great large light performance space - well maintained. Staff super helpful. Need to flyer day before as not a lot of passing people or all going somewhere. No real stage. Smoke machine not advised as fire alarm sensitive. No storage. Poor turnout but that could be that we didnt do enough flyering. Learnt loads
Show report for Lets Talk About S*X show 311 (Theatre) Time 10.45PM Full Run except Mondays. The venue manager and staff were great and really helpful. The separate room upstairs to perform in was good. Enough stage space for us to use, and the could seat around 35/40 at a push. The room had a see through wall at one side which as we had our stage blacks with us we blacked out to make it more of a venue feel. We also erected a small wing which covered the TV on the other side and provided a little storage area, as the venue has none which other shows found useful to leave props. We also brought a lighting bar which other shows could use which gave it more of a theatrical feel. Audience wise we struggled and we really did a lot of flyering. We flyered outside the venue and also the mile which did bring a couple of people in. We never broke into double figures for our audience and had a couple of no shows. But we learnt loads about how the fringe works and getting to play with our show each night was invaluable. We think this venue is great for stand up comedy but for theatre and the time we had it did not work for our show Im afraid.
Show Report for One Eyed Scouts - Improvised Movie Fun Show 160 1.25pm daily 9 days. We returned for our second year performing at this venue. Main things to note from this year -Last year we found that getting audience from flyering can be difficult as there aren't that many Fringe goers in the area surrounding the venue. This year we registered for the Ed Fringe app and most of our audience had found us in the Wee Blue Book book or on the Ed fringe App. Audience numbers varied from 0 to 12 with weekends being busier and a lull midweek. Staff at Brewdog were very helpful We were one of the earlier shows each day and as such often had to ask the staff to switch on the main lights in the room - the switch for these isn't i the room but though a staff only door. There are lots of spaces to add your posters within Brewdog and a table for flyers outside the room The space is large enough for 4 of us to be on stage at the same time. This year another group (see show report for show 1113) had brought additional items such as stage lights.this year and the wing they had created was very helpful - Thank you!
Sorry I put wrong show number above it should have been 311 Lets talk about S*X! Think I still need to catch up on sleep
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Show report (part 1 of 2) Brewdog Lothian Road (venue 102) Show number 326 (7:15pm 4th/6th/8th/10th/12th/14th/16th/18th) WE HAVE TO THINK OF A REALLY GOOD SHOW NAME SAID THE CLUMSY DANES BRAIN Natasha and Angela (The Dane and The Brain) There was sufficient performance space for our show - 2 performers, lots of props, dancing. It was handy having the seating along the back of the performance area for keeping our props close to hand. The performance space was the back room of the bar - so no blackout on the windows or backdrop behind performance space (which was fine for our show but wouldnt suit all types of shows) The staff were nice and friendly, we made a promo video pouring a pint (but they didnt share it till after we left haha) - they are good at working with performers and making us feel welcomed. The staff let us use some seating upstairs to chill out before the show / run lines etc. They also gave us a discount. There was lots of space for posters. Another act created a sign to go outside the venue to point people to the shows inside which was great. The table for display flyers was a bit hidden away and it would be nice to bring that to the front of the venue if possible for future years. Our audiences ranged from 1 person to 11 people. We flyered outside the venue as we were dancing and the music from The Lady Boys of Bangkok kept us energised.
Show report (part 2 of 2) Brewdog Lothian Road (venue 102) Show number 326 (7:15pm 4th/6th/8th/10th/12th/14th/16th/18th) WE HAVE TO THINK OF A REALLY GOOD SHOW NAME SAID THE CLUMSY DANES BRAIN Natasha and Angela (The Dane and The Brain) There was some distraction from sounds of the bar beyond our room and traffic outside (we had windows open as otherwise it was very hot!) also the occasional person poking their head in lost looking for the toilet - once a sign was put up saying shows in there it helped. On our closing show, about halfway into our show, something went wrong with the ventilation from the kitchen which came right through the room, us and our audience were coughing / unable to breathe. One of our audience went out to find out what was happening and in the end we had to cut the show there as we had to get fresh air / everyone in the upstairs area of the pub was closing. They offered for us to perform in the area just outside the room but it was just as bad there and time constraints meant we couldnt finish our finale. Overall, apart from the sad situation with that finale, we had a lot of fun and the venue was quite suitable for our show. Location makes it quite tricky to get bums on seats and we didnt register for the official fringe guide or app so we were reliant on our own and PBH advertising (and we were also in the femifringe guide!).
Here's some pics of The Brain walking into the venue a few days before fringe started. (some of the tables got moved)
Show report for Grad Habits, show 252 at 3.45pm. There was sufficient space for our props and to walk around, but it would have been nice to have curtains or a backdrop. Also difficult without a raised stage for some audience members at the back to see some of the props. Also the noise from the street could be quite distracting. Staff was great but some audience members did get a little lost looking for the room it was in so perhaps some signposting could be used next year. We did a lot of flyering in and around the venue as well as along the Royal Mile, and we did get a decent number of audience members each day.
Show 436 'Shedding Light' - 12.15-13.00 August 3-6, 7-13. I did 10 spoken word shows altogether, as a Solo performer, and it was my first ever Fringe performance. I loved the whole experience. I had between 2-18 people each day, mainly thanks to lots of networking in advance. The room felt pretty full to me when I had 18 people. Audiences were great, and very generous with cash, despite warnings about the lack of cash around. I was glad I hadn't bothered to get a card reader. I am not convinced the effort of flyering was worth it - especially given how quiet Brewdog and the Lothian Road were at lunchtime. The Usher Hall (opposite) was sometimes busy outside. I got some audience members by chatting to staff in cafes all round Edinburgh and leaving flyers and wee blue books with them. As others have said, Brewdog staff were great, Dave W was very supportive, as were my fellow performers (before and after me), and we watched each other's shows, and had no issues with door duty, setting up the room in good time between shows etc. Meeting together the day before we started really helped to get a sense of the room, and to get to know each other. It was good to meet other first-time Fringe performers. I also enjoyed PBH's fringe party on August 2, and had a good chat with PBH himself.
Show 460 'Fruit n Veg' with Professor Richard Pickings 2.35 for the full run. Part One. 20 shows: 110 people and 5 dogs (Dog friendly venue was worth a mention when flyering). Within that restricted number, the attendance was surprisingly international: Estonia, France, South Africa, the Netherlands, Pakistan, Canada as well as locals and England. Oh, and 2 Japanese and 1 South Korean who smiled politely as the wordplay whooshed past their heads. I have these details because I kept a guest book for comments which is the nearest I got to reviews luckily all positive. I kept the show a bit shorter at 45-50 mins so as not to rush the changeover. In spite of the numbers, I sold 63 books of my poems at 5 a copy, which was a great result. Not much actual cash on top of that. Glad I did the full run: I came to learn, have fun and not lose too much money. Three ticks. 2.35 not a bad slot. I flyered before for 1-2 hours as a warm-up, and usually did a shorter session afterwards, while still buzzing. Flyering mostly on the doorstep or out on the main road: good little cultural cluster - Usher Hall and Traverse over the road and Ladyboys of Bangkok camped out next door in their big marquee. Good idea to cross the road when crowds are gathering for a concert at Usher Hall. I did some flyering beyond when on the hoof to other places. My usual line for WBB: All the Free shows in one free book grab your copy now! Spoken word category puts one at a disadvantage compared to comedy, even though my material was entirely humorous. I did envy the audiences for stand-up and sketch shows. Perhaps I should have paid to be in the main Fringe brochure as well, but not convinced that the difference would have paid for itself.
Show 460 'Fruit n Veg' Report Part 2
Show 460 'Fruit n Veg' Report Part 2 Perhaps because its free you get some very late arrivals who think its okay to sample half a show. In my experience it was really useful to do the duty outside to reassure latecomers for the preceding show that its okay to walk in. And I was grateful when my following show did the same for me. Dave Winterbottom, last years captain, was a star: strong, helpful and experienced presence for the first 2 weeks. We were all beneficiaries of Steve and Karina who erected a black fabric wing stage right and put masking up over the internal window and left a set of lights out that we could use to warm up the performance area. Storage issues: I had to shift someones inflatable flamingos and crocs to the back. Glad I brought an extension lead for my blender (!) Good intimate space with no real need for a mike in my case. And I never really noticed noise from the street. I thought the table outside was a bit dark to work well for browsers. There was a big roadside venue display, but not enough signage outside the main entrance down the passageway. A more visible and welcoming display would have made a difference to passing trade. I got blackboard and chalks from Alis Cave emporium over the road and down a bit they sell everything, even a shelf full of grannies. Taxi pull-in on the main road useful for an emergency trip back to digs for a crucial forgotten prop. Great staff at the BrewDog one kindly slipped me a free flat white or three.
Show: The Improv Railway (Show number 607 I believe) by the BU & AUB Improv Society Dates and times: 11-14 & 16-18th August at 16:55-17:45 Donations given: 221 overall A nice venue with most people finding us through flyering and the wee blue book. The staff were lovely and accommodating and the venue was always nice and tidy! Venue was pretty quiet at the time of our slot (16:55-17:45) which did mean we didn't have very many walk ins or people to flyer to outside of the venue, so majority of our flyering was done on the Royal Mile (which was busy but people are often willing to take flyers). Audience per night varied, with most week nights being only approx. 3 people, and the weekend being around 15-20 (Tuesday was also around 15). I think partially the low audience was due to the location being a little far out compared to some of the others. The room would get quite warm so we would open the window; this did unfortunately create some traffic noises, mainly when emergency services would pass with sirens which usually happened once per performance. However otherwise it was very quiet. We managed to perform with 8 people on stage at once (usually 4-6 on the backline and 2-4 in the scene). It was a tight squeeze but definitely manageable provided you don't have much equipment. There aren't many good locations in the room to place recording equipment should you wish to record your shows, however we managed to place a camera on a tripod at the back and get decent enough quality recordings. We didn't require any speakers this year etc. so cannot comment on that unfortunately. We'd happily take the same location again next year!