There is wonder here in Edinburgh, and it is being ignored. There is beauty and there is fun and there is the kind of hour that, in the words of one of my favourite films "reaches in and puts a string of coloured lights round your heart". It has been 22 years since I sat in a Fringe audience and felt what I felt here today. This is the kind of writing, and performing, and skill and joy and passion that, in this combative, destructive world, we almost never have the privilege to experience.
Reaches in and puts a string of coloured lights round your heart
We are, says our fairy friend, “all in the process of becoming”.
This spell-binding hour is an other-worldly allegory which, while as seemingly light and delicate as gossamer lace, carries the stories and the hopes of all those who have never felt free to 'become' much less come out to be acknowledged and, even, loved.
It might look fey, it might look simplistic, it might look even ridiculous, but it is the kind of hour that can change your world, given a chance.
In a time when it seems that the best we can do is shout, and hate, and tweet, and threaten, when we are all about divisions, binary 'you are either for me or against me' divisions, this hour should be seen everywhere. Everywhere.
I have always thought of theatre, any theatre, as just make-believe, sometimes aggrandised by set and costumes and whatever else it takes.
More important to those who do it than those who see it. Celeste Lecesne creates a magic bubble, that, in the hour, holds the whole audience, but, given the opportunity, could hold the world. It won't. But they are starting. As they pop backwards and forwards through the fourth wall, Celeste makes you believe you can become.
Go. Just go. Celeste Lecesne has all the stars I never gave, and the red pencil to make them matter the right way. Poof! may be the loveliest hour of your life.
