Bouncy Castle Dracula

There are times when being a reviewer is a tough gig. Every once in a while, a little show comes along that is pulled off with energy and enthusiasm but which is, in essence, the biggest load of crap you have ever witnessed. “Sure,” you tell yourself, “it looks like they took all of five minutes to write this dross, but look at their eager little faces! How could I possibly live with myself after ripping this drivel to shreds in the full glare of the Fringe-going public?”

Well, the number nine has a lot to do with the answer to this question. Nine pounds sterling to be precise. This is the vast and inflated quantity of hard, ready cash that it will set you back to sit through what is certain to be, without any hint of exaggeration, the longest hour of your life. But fear not, for Fest Magazine will not stand by idly and let you stumble across Bouncy Castle Dracula without due warning.

The Strolling Theatricals—apparently famous for their portrayals of great literary classics through the underestimated medium of the bouncy castle—are clearly a far from professional troupe of players. Appalling acting is married, seamlessly, with shoddy props and a banal script that could only have been dreamt up by the most languidly arrogant of writers.

Should you be forming the thoroughly incorrect opinion that this ramshackle setup gives the performance any kind of endearing, bohemian quality, please disabuse yourself of that opinion now – Carry on Dracula, this is not. Were he here today, I fear that even the great Kenneth Williams would find it hard to ask the question, “exactly how big is your Schloss?” without vomiting his duodenum out of his nose. Indeed, once the minutiae of the double entendre that Strolling Theatricals were trying to get at has been meticulously laid out before you, severing the tip of your own tongue will be all you can do to avoid running on stage and putting a sizable fire arm to work on the cast and crew.

To say that Bouncy Castle Dracula is undeserving of your money misses the point. It is exactly this kind of slag heap theatre that should be throttled at birth in Edinburgh to avoid even a single Festival-goer from shunning the genuinely great productions on offer here for fear of being conned out of the best part of a tenner.