Onstage orgasms, live tattooing, ‘embracing our mucky parts’ … Edinburgh fringe artists take it to the limit

In The Faustus Project, which opened at the Underbelly on Thursday, the titular character is played by a guest performer every night – one who hasn’t learned their lines and will be continually frustrated by tricks from their cast mates. There will be unexpected entrances, arbitrary rules and a box taped to the stage that they must avoid standing on.

“We try to make that performance as difficult for them as possible, in a way that simulates the trials the character has to go through,” says director and performer Caden Scott. “It’s a crazy late-night experience, but also a commentary on the fringe and artistry and fame itself.” In one case, one guest performer with a broken foot ended up wrestling the rest of the cast, and while Scott and team do suss out each performer’s boundaries beforehand, the goal is “always to push the line”, he says.

Rosa Garland’s Primal Bog, which opened on Friday, is a show about “embracing our mucky parts, unconventional desire, the risks we take when we open up”. It’s very physical – you’ll see her writhing in slime and getting a new tattoo on stage every night. “I’m drawn to adrenaline things,” she says. “I love Jackass and this show is inspired by that.

But while you might think the tattooing would be Garland’s main challenge, for her it’s emotional daring that requires real steel. “The more endurance-y stuff is the vulnerability of a long clown segment: it’s just me and the audience and I’m opening myself up to them. You want to make them laugh … and there’s a particular feeling of crushingness about standing naked in front of a sea of blank faces with your slimy tits hanging out.”

Conversely, getting tattooed feels “grounding” for Garland, and encapsulates the show’s heart: “I’m interested in this idea of the exchange between me and the audience changing me permanently.”

Australian artist Emma Maye Gibson, known by her onstage persona Betty Grumble, makes similar physical offerings. She is bringing her show Enemies of Grooviness Eat Sh!t to the fringe for the first time. In it, she explores experiences of intimate partner violence.

It is the role of artists to discover “what’s possible when we’re brave enough to test boundaries”, she says. She describes “the heart of the show” as the moment when she experiences an orgasm on stage in an act of reclamation of her body and sexuality.

“It’s designed to be ritualistic,” Gibson says. The show approaches the moment “matter of factly”, giving audience members the chance to leave or close their eyes – or to grab a homemade shaker and build to a musical climax, as well as to her physical one.

For Gibson, the endurance isn’t about the physical act but the psychological context. “I have to handle it with care to not re-wound myself, for this to feel restorative for myself and the audience,” she says. “[I’m] holding the complexity of the very real memories I have in my body and the endemic that we see in Australia of domestic violence.” While “the exhaustion is real” as the festival unfolds, Gibson enjoys the challenge. “I love a marathon, so I can feel myself kicking into the motor of that.”

The festival will be a physical endurance test, too, for comedian and The Chase quizzer Paul Sinha. His show this year looks back to 2023, when he had two heart attacks but decided to return to the stage regardless. Sinha has been a fringe regular for two decades, but that year, he had sold out “officially the biggest show of my career. I couldn’t bear the idea of cancelling.” The financial consequences felt daunting too, so he got back to work, but for the rest of the run he was constantly alert to signs of cardiac distress. “I look back and think: madness.”

Now, he adds: “What I find most amazing is that it took so long for me to have a health crisis at Edinburgh. [The festival] is an incredibly stressful experience, even if you’re a healthy-eating teetotaler. You’re looking for approval from audiences, you’re constantly worried about not reaching your ambitions, you’re away from home and detached from your normal reality. It all adds up. It is amazingly unhealthy.”

On top of his cardiac issues, Sinha has Parkinson’s and decided to challenge himself by incorporating live music into his comedy, playing the keyboard every night. “I can never truly relax because I never know what my fingers will be able to do.”

Garland says it’s the run-up to the festival that is the real endurance test, as artists work to find the money to put on their shows. “I’ve just arrived and my body feels like it has already been through an Edinburgh fringe,” she says. “It’s a marathon, it’s an endurance thing – much more than getting a tattoo!”

Photograph by Corinne Cumming