Edinburgh Festival Day 12: Word of Mouth

PETER ARTHUR from Australia is convinced a conspiracy is afoot. The solicitor, clutching a redundant ticket outside the now defunct FEAST, said he had crossed the world to hear conductors Erich Leinsdorf and Claus Tennstedt. Tennstedt was ill. Leinsdorf was inexplicably replaced. 'I think they got someone else more cheaply,' he remarks angrily. Justine Cottle from Cambridge had rather more luck with John Wright Co's On the Verge of Exploding. 'There was a magnificent scene on a rocking horse, and the woman who played the child had the most expressive body. I noticed her big toe.' Ned Sherrin seems easy to please. He's seen Tony Hawks's Heartbreak Kid, Craig Ferguson in Accidental Death of an Anarchist and Lee Evans and loved them all. Coincidentally, they are all on at the Assembly Rooms, across the road from his hotel.