2026 Edinburgh Fringe Spotlight

The Edinburgh Festival Fringe has wrapped for another year, and two Concord Theatricals titles came away with Bragi Awards, awarded to productions that embody creativity, experimentation and excellence within new writing and contemporary performance. Below are the productions we publish that played the 2026 Festival – and how they fared.

For Dolores by Eva O’Connor (UK)
(Full-Length Play, Dramatic Comedy / 2w)
Mo, the Scottish one, and Réaltín, the Irish one, partied, played and blazed their way through the Edinburgh student dream. Set in Glasgow a couple of years later, For Dolores is about friendship, motherhood and coming to terms with your worst mistakes. Like twin stars in obsessive orbit, it is a friendship, a rivalry and an adventure. Risk is a delicious pleasure, until it all explodes in the blink of an eye.

Presented by Fishamble: The New Play Company at the Traverse Theatre and directed by Jim Culleton, For Dolores won a Bragi Award in the first wave of 2026 winners. Judges praised Eva O’Connor’s nuanced portrait of female friendship, motherhood, fixation and longing, as well as the electric stage presence of Catriona Faint and Lara McDonnell. The production received five stars from The Arts Review and featured on the cover of The Scotsman’s Festival Guide.

Good With Faces by Oisín Kearney (UK)
(Full-Length Play, Drama / 1w, 1m)
Garrick has tidied her living room and put out the good biscuits. But concerned social worker Hegarty’s questions soon turn into an interrogation. Why has her son got a mysterious bruise? Who is responsible for the child, the parent or the state? And can we ever know what happens behind closed doors? A taut psychological thriller offering a complex interrogation of parenting, power and what it means to care. Winner of the Solas Nua New Voices Award 2025.

At Summerhall, Good With Faces won a Bragi Award in the second wave of 2026 winners, with judges calling it a “taut and deeply assured piece of new writing” and “exactly what the awards were made for.” It took four stars from both The Stage and The Scotsman.

Julius Caesar Variety Show by Joy Nesbitt (UK)
(Full-Length Play, Dark Comedy / 1w, 4m)
During the 2023 Dublin riot, a Black actor, a woman actor and a straight white male actor audition for a part in Shakespeare’s The Tragedy of Julius Caesar. The three attempt to impress a revered director set on reinventing the play in ‘unorthodox’ styles, and as the audition unfolds, the actors’ identities are brought into the room and exploited for better performances. Provocative and darkly humorous, Julius Caesar Variety Show interrogates the evolving role of diversity and inclusion within the theatre industry, and the ever-widening impacts of the rise of the far-right, anti-immigration movement.

Nominated for four Dublin Fringe Awards, the play made its UK premiere at Summerhall. Binge Fringe awarded four stars and The Skinny called it “a wonderfully charming hidden Fringe gem.”

Mrs. Stern Wanders the Prussian State Library by Jenny Lyn Bader (US/UK)
(Full-Length Play. Drama / 1w, 2m)
Berlin, 1933. With martial law in effect, political activism has become a capital crime. The Gestapo has arrested a graduate student suspected of conducting illegal research and the arrival of a lawyer sent to defend her only complicates matters. But the encounter takes surprising turns as an earnest young officer must interrogate the iconic political thinker Hannah Arendt, a woman in possession of untold wit, charm and ideas. Inspired by real events, this fantastical drama delves into the life and mind of one of history’s deepest intellects.

Following a critically acclaimed off-Broadway premiere, Mrs. Stern made its European premiere at the Traverse Theatre as part of TravFest26, presented by Luna Stage and Richard Jordan Productions and directed by Ari Laura Kreith.

The Pitch by Philip Catherwood (UK)
(Full-Length Play, Dramatic Comedy / 1w, 2m)
Robbie has lived in East Belfast his whole life, training on the same football pitch every day. When plans are announced to refurbish his favourite place into a GAA ground, he feels like he’s losing everything. Then he meets Deren, a Gaelic footballer who has been waiting for a local pitch of his own. The pitch becomes a refuge for an unlikely trio, a place to practise, to argue and to make sense of the country they have grown up in. But with a United Ireland referendum gaining momentum, will these three remain friends after the result is announced?

Produced by Moya Jane Productions with the Lyric Theatre Belfast, The Pitch made its Scottish premiere at Pleasance Courtyard as part of the Edinburgh National Partnerships programme. Binge Fringe gave it five stars, calling the script equal parts sensitive, playful and often ebullient.

To discover even more inventive contemporary works, explore our full collection at Concord Theatricals in the US or UK.