Edinburgh Festival '99: Fringe

THEATRE

Journey to Macbeth 99

Royal Botanic Garden, Venue 193 (0374 167352) 9.30pm, to 30 Aug

It's difficult to know where to start with this one. Taking in a range of influences from Baz Luhrmann's Romeo & Juliet, Carry On Doctor and It's a Knockout, Theatrum Botanicum's "interpretation" of Macbeth incorporates stilt-walkers, acrobats, lap-dancers - and a country and western singer, I kid you not.

King Duncan's character is lifted straight from The Godfather and Banquo is a dead ringer for Andy Capp.

But it's real purpose is to act as a vehicle for the talents of Dannii Minogue which, I'm afraid, are painfully thin. Ade Sapara's guilt-racked protagonist plays second fiddle to Minogue's salacious Evil Edna who punctures any building tension with her school-girl shrieking.

That said, Minogue is by no means the worst offender in this production.

That prize should rest with director Toby Gough who, one can only presume, mistook the cast for a travelling circus.

If he's not getting them to walk around in pointless circles, they are bumping into one another like clowns, and lacerating their lungs trying to make themselves heard over a soundtrack of nosebleed techno.

An unmitigated disaster.