Fringe At Center Stage

It used to be that the Edinburgh Fringe was an adjunct to the tonier Edinburgh Festival. No longer. “For the 250,000 odd who pour into the Scottish capital – a 50 per cent population increase – the chief draw is the Festival Fringe (August 3 to 25). Once a mere tangent to the snootier international festival, it is now the world’s biggest arts event. Scorning fears of SARS, terrorism and war, hotel-room bookings are buoyant, ticket sales are robust and records have already been broken: there will be 21,594 performances of 1541 shows by 668 companies in 207 venues, the first time the number of venues has topped 200, 24 more than last year.”