Will the Fringe become a victim of its own success?

It’s now regarded as sacrilegious to criticise or question the place of the various Edinburgh festivals in the canon of Scottish success stories.

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Not only do they contribute millions of pounds to the Scottish economy and attract thousands of visitors to the city every year, they also help to keep the country relevant in an age of cutthroat global competitiveness.

At a time when so much else of value in Scotland is under threat and in decline, the festivals remain shining examples of something we can still genuinely claim to do better than anyone else.

While organisers of the International Festival, the International Book Festival and the International Film Festival have all trumpeted the success of this year’s events, there are growing siren voices around the future health and direction of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

As the festivals drew to a close this week, Shona McCarthy, chief executive of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe Society, warned in an open letter that the “fragility of the performing arts community is palpable”, adding that an “outward veneer of success cannot mask the struggle for artists to emerge let alone thrive in the UK right now.”

As its name suggests, the Fringe was initially conceived as a sideshow to the main event, a platform where emerging, non-mainstream and avant-garde talent could find an audience.

Anyone familiar with the legend will know that it began in 1947 when, against a backdrop of post-war austerity, eight theatre groups turned up uninvited to perform at the Edinburgh International Festival.

Despite not being part of the official programme, they staged their shows on the “fringe” of the festival, spawning a spontaneous artistic movement that has since been joined by millions of performers and audience members.

Despite only ever being intended as an adjunct to the International Festival, its momentum and popularity has grown year on year to the point where, in financial terms at least, it is now the main event.

However, not everyone agrees that the continued growth of the Fringe is necessarily a good thing. There are complaints from some quarters that the festival has become too big, too homogenous, prioritising quantity over quality and satisfying neither audiences nor performers.

Visitors complain that the programme has become so vast it is overwhelming, making it difficult to be discerning about what shows to see.

Performers at even the most popular shows complain about the ruthlessly rising costs of coming to Edinburgh where the best of all possible outcomes is that they will break even.

Earlier this year Sir Cameron Mackintosh, the theatre producer, said he believed the Fringe had outgrown its host city.

Pointing to the sheer volume of shows competing for a finite audience, he warned that it was creating an unsustainable environment for performers and companies grappling with huge costs.

Fringe supporters might argue it was ever thus and, reading back through newspaper cuttings from my time in the city in the mid-1990s, there were articles then about how it had become too big.

As a comparator however, in 1993 there were 1,235 separate shows at the Fringe, compared with 3,746 this year – meaning it is now more than three times as big.

Sir Cameron’s concerns were echoed by Ross Mollison, producer of the successful Atomic Saloon Show, who said the Fringe's ability to attract large-scale, ambitious productions has "diminished dramatically" due to a lack of suitable venues, restrictions on ticket prices, and the escalating cost of accommodation in Edinburgh.

This, he believes, discourages producers from taking million-pound risks on new projects, limiting the festival's artistic scope.

Richard Demarco, a stalwart supporter of the Edinburgh festivals since their inception, has lamented the Fringe's shift towards commercialism, criticising its relentless focus on stand-up comedy over ground-breaking theatrical productions, and claiming that it has lost sight of its original artistic vision.

The rising cost of living, coupled with soaring accommodation prices in Edinburgh, is making participation increasingly unsustainable.

Even as big-name comedians return with work-in-progress shows, many lesser-known artists are questioning the financial viability of performing at the Fringe, with some opting for shorter runs or alternative festivals.

The ease with which landlords can capitalise on the festival crowds has driven up rental prices to exorbitant levels (Image: Getty)

The financial strain extends beyond individual performers. The festival itself experienced a dip in ticket sales after the pandemic, impacting revenue streams for both large venues and small businesses reliant on the August boom.

The near-collapse of the prestigious Edinburgh Comedy Awards due to sponsorship withdrawal highlighted the precarious financial state of the arts industry. While the awards were ultimately salvaged, the incident served as a reminder of the broader economic headwinds facing the Fringe.

A significant contributor to the affordability crisis is the proliferation of short-term lets, particularly through platforms like Airbnb. The ease with which landlords can capitalise on the festival crowds has driven up rental prices to exorbitant levels, making it nearly impossible for many artists to secure housing for the month.

While the Scottish Government has taken some steps to regulate the private rental sector, the impact of short-term lets remains a pressing concern. Activists and residents are calling for stricter measures to curb this trend and protect the long-term affordability of Edinburgh's housing market.

The Fringe has weathered storms before, adapting to changing trends and economic realities and its inherent dynamism and ability to self-correct and evolve may yet ultimately ensure its survival.

However, this hope is tempered by a presupposition that solutions require collaborative efforts from stakeholders across the board: government bodies, local residents, festival organisers, and artists themselves.

The future of the Fringe hinges on finding a sustainable balance that supports both artistic expression and the wellbeing of the city and its residents, who don’t want to have to dig out their old T-shirts from the 1990s.

Carlos Alba is a journalist, author, and PR consultant. His latest novel, There’s a Problem with Dad, explores the issue of undiagnosed autism among older people.