Lavery Burnout Leads First Round of Fringe Firsts

The first winners of this year’s prestigious Fringe First Awards, celebrating high-quality new drama at the Edinburgh Festival, have been announced by The Scotsman newspaper today (13 August 2010).

Among the winners is Beautiful Burnout, Bryony Lavery‘s boxing drama produced by the National Theatre of Scotland and Frantic Assembly at the Pleasance. The Scotsman‘s Joyce McMillan called the play, which transfers to a gym in east London next month, “spectacular, lyrical and thought-provoking, in its exploration both of physical energy itself, and of the interaction between text and movement”.

The other awards went to: Speechless at the Traverse, which tells the true story of twin black girls living with their family on UK RAF bases in the 1970s; Bare at the Spaces on the Royal Mile, another boxing-centred play, by Renny Krupinski, which follows a bare-knuckle fighter; White, a 40-minute children’s show care of the Traverse and set entirely in a white world which is suddenly invaded by colour; Real Babies Don’t Cry, a psychological thriller at the Gilded Balloon by Stewart Permutt; and My Romantic History, DC Jackson‘s comedic new play which is premiering at the Traverse prior to a tour and transfer to London’s Bush Theatre.

The Fringe First Awards were established in 1973 when there was concern that the Fringe was not attracting the right quantity and quality of shows. The awards are announced weekly during the festival, with the next round winners being announced next Friday. There is no fixed number given and the only requirement is that the work must be new – having had no more than six performances in the UK, prior to the Fringe.