EDINBURGH 2025: Pick of the Programme- Returning Shows

With over 3000 shows now on sale for the 2025 Edinburgh Festival Fringe, trying to narrow down what to see can be a bit of a task. BWW Scotland editor Natalie O'Donoghue has selected her top ten picks across different categories in the festival programme to highlight the shows you really don't want to miss this year!

This selection is shows that have had previous runs at the festival and are back for more. So if you missed them last time- now's your chance!

Swamplesque   

The hottest ticket of Fringe 2024. Everyone's favourite ogre-inspired burlesque and drag parody is coming back to Edinburgh! Swamplesque is the award-winning, critically acclaimed, five-star rated burlesque parody show!

Shamilton! The Improvised Hip-Hop Musical

Baby Wants Candy's 2024 total sell-out hip-hop hit returns! We improvise an epic musical based on a historical figure/celebrity of your choosing (Genghis Khan, Paul Hollywood, Kim Kardashian, anyone!). Just like Hamilton but (ahem) better! Expect the same level of hip hop, storytelling, stunning choreography and powerhouse singing, except made up on the spot. 

A Jaffa Cake Musical 

Time to decide once and for all... cake or biscuit? Inspired by the 1991 tribunal which determined the true identity of a Jaffa Cake, multi award-winning family-friendly musical makers Gigglemug Theatre (Scouts! The Musical, RuneSical, Timpson: The Musical) return to the Fringe with their latest sell-out smash-hit comedy that really takes the biscuit (or cake?).

5 Mistakes That Changed History 

We all make mistakes, but rarely do they change the course of history. After sell-out seasons in 2023 and 2024, the smash-hit historical storytelling comedy returns with five new stories about mistakes (big and small!) that changed the world. If you love history, don't let your mistake be missing out on this show!

Pop Off, Michelangelo! 

After a smash hit 2024 season and fresh off a 9-week London run, best-pals-turned-bitter-rivals Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci return to Edinburgh! A bloodthirsty friar is on the hunt for homosexuals in Renaissance Italy just when childhood friends Mike and Leo realise they both like boys. Terrified, they devise a foolproof plan to gain God's forgiveness: become the greatest religious artists of all time. Can Michelangelo gaslight, gatekeep and girlboss his way to the Vatican? Will Leonardo ever shut up about his helicopter? Featuring an original electropop score as infectious as the bubonic plague.

The Insider 

Fringe First Winner. Acting, visuals, and a binaural soundscape that send chills down your spine, exploring greed and large-scale financial fraud. A contemporary Wolf of Wall Street on stage. Based on a real scandal. 50 Billion GBP was robbed from treasuries around Europe. A young bank lawyer is sucked into a criminal financial network. 

Pals 

Female-led and female-produced, PALS is a Scottish adventure-comedy play telling the story of four, crude, chaotic yet completely normal gal pals as they embark on a camping trek in the west of Scotland. In a bid to escape their lives, have a riotous time and avoid several mental breakdowns, these "Perfectly Average Lassies of Scotland" are completely out of their depths, in more ways than one. 

Trainspotting Live 

Acclaimed immersive adaptation of Irvine Welsh's classic novel, staged in a bespoke venue unique to the show. The audience are literally part of the action, including the notorious 'worst toilet in Scotland' scene.

Potty The Plant 

A charmingly dark, whimsically adult, joyously subversive, musical delight! Starring our titular character, Potty! A singing, talking, tap dancing, potted plant. When mysterious events begin to occur at Little Boo Boo's General Hospital, a ragtag bunch of dysfunctional nurses must pull together to save the day. What could be happening to all the missing children? Will the beautiful Miss Lacey ever find true love? Is there more to the nasty-looking Dr Acula than meets the eye? Potty The Plant is an hour of side-splitting, earwormy, musical fun, that begs the audience to not take anything too seriously.

I Wish My Life Were Like A Musical 

Award-winning musical comedy revue revealing all about musicals and the people who love them – on both sides of the curtain! Updated for 2025 with new songs. Lauded with an unprecedented 50 five-star reviews for multiple sell-out Fringe and London seasons.

For the full programme check out www.edfringe.com

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