Fringe: Theatre: The Town That Went Mad

Edinburgh Festival 97

Theatre The Town That Went Mad

Under Milk Wood meets the bawdiness of The Canterbury Tales and the sexuality of Tom Jones in a show that revels in its earthiness, from the Welsh theatre company Volcano. The piece explores the character of the Welsh people, their traits, failings and, crucially, their relationship with the English through a series of spectacularly inventive physical set-pieces that vary from episodes of dynamic movement to beautiful frozen tableaux. Continuously subverting theatre forms, The Town That Went Mad, is effortlessly hilarious rather than grindingly pretentious. The production at first sight seems thrown together in a ramshackle way but it becomes rapidly apparent that every second is choreographed precisely.

To 30 Aug (exc 21 and 26). The Pleasance, Venue 33. (0131-556 6550) Anthony Thornton