Fringe Magic
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Fringe Magic 〰️
Image: Will Hearle
It’s time for Edinburgh Fringe 2025, and with it, our annual feature series! This year, we’re celebrating the special, unique Fringe moments — the ones that feel like pure MAGIC…
By Lorna Rose Treen
1. Smell
What is smell? And why do dogs smell stuff far away, but I can’t? Not only is that unfair, but it’s magic.
2. 3G, 4G and 5G
My engineer sister and engineer father have both tried to explain this to me but I don’t get it. How is it that I can see them both on FaceTime, yelling at me about electromagnetic fields and masts, whilst at the same time I click a button which turns me into a cat which they can immediately see and be annoyed by? Without anything being plugged in! Magic.
3. Aeroplanes
It doesn’t seem right that something at least three times the length of my legs (long), and 100 times the width of my London flat (small) can stay in the air like a balloon.
4. People in school who enjoyed doing the bleep test
It made me very suspicious that people enjoyed going really fast back and forward across the gym, without going anywhere! What sort of physical incantation were they brewing? Were they trying to cloud bust? There must be another purpose other than pain but I don’t know what it is.
5. Gravity
I don’t get it
6. The Stock Market
I don’t get it
7. How babies are made
No one will tell me!
8. Falling in love
Possibly neurotransmitters and hormones. Probably magic.
9. The 1974 song by Scottish pop-rock band Pilot
10. My ability to turn into a horse at will
I don’t understand it, doctors don’t believe it, but if I blink four times in a mirror and yell my name backwards, it happens. It must be magic. Or whatever is cut with the black mould I keep eating.
Lorna Rose Treen: 24 Hour Diner People is at Pleasance Courtyard (Beneath) from July 30th-August 24th. Tickets here
Read more about Edinburgh Fringe 2025:
“You’ll have to see the show! No, but seriously – I told you that’s not my card! Wait no way, hang on why are you taking your sock off? No way! Oh my God! Yes! That is my card! “
“They're just singer-songwriters trying to make their art. Their voices are so powerful they move people to tears and madness. It's not the Sirens' fault if audiences are losing their minds.”
“Having up to that point been just a regular organic human, Bob Dylan had his internal organs and central nervous system replaced by electronic circuitry at great expense to both himself and the US national grid.”
“Francisco de Nata is no ordinary giraffe. He’s got a long neck full of dreams, a heart bubbling with custard, and a special love for his Avó (Grandma), whose secret recipe changed his life forever…”
“Things have changed a lot since the distant past, most notably since 1896 when Athens first introduced the “modern” concept of the “Fringe”. With groovy new venues such as “big pool”, “running track” and “velodrome”. And PR and marketing stunts such as BIG TORCH and BIG RINGS.”
“‘Sorry about him, Rohan’s got a cruel wit,” Dan says as he hoists his body off the table and onto a kitchen chair. ‘Shall we start the interview?’ He fuses his head with his body. My god they’re good at magic.”
“Love Actually is high. Inception is low. Films and TV shows about divorce are for adults. Films and TV shows about planet bleep bloop are for children.”
“Becoming a monetary wizard was actually quite hard. I had to scrub the shoes of the more senior wizards, I gave up my evenings to count gold pieces in merchant stores in places I’d never been before. Places like Staines.”
Cabbage that Clown presents their magical movie masterpiece, binbags, exclusively screening on LMAOnaise
“The king wandered the streets and inns and markets. He was surprised that, without his crown on his head, no one seemed to know who he was. After searching and searching and finding nothing, he noticed the sun had nearly set so he raced back to the castle. But it was too late…”
Rohan Sharma, Daniel McKeon, Shalaka Kurup, Sharon Wanjohi and Marty Gleeson reveal their childhood imaginary friends to Su Mi
“It’s the Fringe again and, while it’s easy to get bogged down in anxieties about tickets, costs, show option paralysis and Scottish weather, it’s good to remember that, as the saying goes, there are cathedrals everywhere for those with eyes to see them.“
“As the pressure mounts, I remind myself that people adore Alan because he was great at his job as a football player on the pitch. Everywhere else, he’s balanced, nice, and doesn’t need to stay up all night in the Pleasance Courtyard.”
“You think you fancy them when they are doing their talent, then you meet them and realise it was only their talent you liked and you don’t actually want them to show you any tricks with their wand. “
“I love slime. I think it’s magic. It’s full of meaning but is also just fun to play with. It’s innocent and childish, it’s terrifying and disgusting. It’s uncontainable, it’s sexy, it’s stupid, it’s completely inconvenient. Aspirational, tbh.”
