In the age of credit crunches, coalitions and corporate tax evasion there has been no better time to take a stand. But is protesting all about placards and petitions – or is there a fun way of getting people involved?

Stand-up comedian Chris Coltrane thinks so.

‘There are a lot of campaigns and protests that are quite boring,’ Coltrane says. ‘There will be a march and at the end a group of men (and occasionally a woman) will talk. It’s so dispiriting, so very safe. The government can ignore a march. They do ignore marches all the time. Marches don’t get in the way or disrupt anything. You have to apply to do a march and the government say “sure, you do your march, we’ll set out the route and monitor the whole thing”. Action needs to be direct, but not violent.’

Asked if he’s had much trouble delivering highly politicised material, Coltrane shrugs. The crowd is usually on his wavelength, he explains. ‘I’ve had a couple of heckles,’ Chris recollects, ‘often because people don’t understand the material. There’s a bit in my show when I hold up the Daily Mail and say “I’ve always trusted this newspaper” – obviously that’s a joke. But one bloke booed me as if I was a real supporter. My show must really have confused him. “this guys a bit confused,” he must have thought, “he hates gay people but has sex with men, he loves the police even though they’ve arrested his mates.” I once mentioned the job fare scheme and the idea that the unemployed need more work experience before applying for jobs and one man shouted “hear hear!” Frankly, I demolished him. The audience were entirely on my side.’

Coltrane gives the audience a leaflet on first steps in activism as they leave. ‘There’s no fun way of putting real advice into the show,’ he says. ‘Also, there’s always the danger that people won’t remember what you said. I like to think the show is inspiring and theres no point inspiring people if they have no idea what to do next.’

I ask Coltrane what final statement he would deliver to everyone who watches his show or reads this interview. I expect a call to arms; a strong message in support of civil unrest. Instead, I get this: ‘Please give me lots of free chocolate,’ Coltrane says, straight-faced, ‘I like free chocolate. Especially Maltesers, Kinder Bueno and those little French macarons. I like lots of them and they’re very expensive. This is completely serious. I want free chocolate.’

It’s safe to say that Coltrane hasn’t lost his sense of fun. That’s what’s so refreshing about him. Unlike many political activists, he doesn’t appear jaded or cynical. He genuinely believes – and, following our chat, so do I – that comedy and congo lines can change the world.

It’s a little late now, perhaps, but here Daniel Piper evaluates something important about performers, critics, and the Fringe. 

Dear Missing String Theatre Company,

As the festival draws to a close and posters start to come down (as do performers and reviewers alike), there’s something I really need to get off my chest before it’s too late.

I gave your debut show, US Beef, a two-star review. I said the following:

‘US Beef, Pleasance Dome. This lively, talented young cast can’t disguise the fact that their message is old. Yes, corporations are evil. 2/5′

Firstly, apologies for the slightly sarcastic tone of the review. It was both your first day and mine which means I was just as eager to impress as you were. A fellow Fringebiscuit reviewer informed me that she chatted to you recently, mentioning who she writes for. You replied, ‘Ah. You guys gave us a two-star review. Oh well, can’t win them all!’ I would just like to say: as a company, you have won me over.

At the risk of sounding like a stalker, I have seen you every single day of the festival. Straight after the show I saw you discussing how best to flyer the Pleasance Dome. In the evening I saw you busking in Bistro Square. And then, in the morning, I saw you doing the same thing at the crack of dawn in The Meadows. I’ve seen this all month.

Recently, at Fringebiscuit Towers, we were discussing our ‘song of the festival’. Most suggested whatever chart drivel soundtracked our preparations for the pub. But I know, deep down, that my song of the festival is ‘He Used To Take Me Dancing’ from US Beef. The song has followed me everywhere. I’ve caught myself humming it over lunch, singing it in the shower and on one occasion drunkenly bawling it at a fellow biscuiteer as we staged a mock breakup in Opium. And just as the song begins to slip from my subconscious, there you are playing it in the street, arms outstretched offering flyers, smiles across all of your faces.

I may have taken issue with your script, but as a company, you guys epitomise everything that is right about the Fringe: young and exuberantly tenacious, with real faith in yourselves, working bloody hard against the odds to grab an audience for your work. I’m glad that my review didn’t stop you singing your hearts out around the city. I wish your company all the luck in the world for what will no doubt be an exciting future.

There. I can go home now.

Rainbow is a production that relies on the perceptions and prejudices of its audience; a brave eighty-five minutes of three asymmetrically opposed characters and their interchanging monologues. At an hour and twenty-five, it’s no easy form to keep a Fringe audience convinced.

The script is littered with winning observations – Vaseline pot etiquette and pointless suede elbow patches – enticing the audience into the terrifyingly mundane characterisation of strangers: a sexually-repressed school teacher, a sensitive assistant hit-man and a school boy with mental disabilities. A play that might become tedious, with each actor barely moving, showcased on podium-style blocks, rarely does. Instead, the way that writer Emily Jenkins leads us down different roads is purely gripping.

It’s dark and utterly bare. A writer once described the best theatrical writing as figuratively stripping a character down, one layer at a time, leaving them naked by the end. Rainbow achieves this, creatively manipulating our preconceived expectations of plot, and consistently digging deeper into the murky personalities of ordinary people.

Rainbow, Zoo Southside. 26-27 Aug, 4.45pm.

A small darkened room, a dead bird, and a Free-Fringe comedy duo. Could this possibly be a joyful experience?

Admittedly I have my doubts – especially as Rose immediately points out the shabbiness of the set (essentially a black sheet), and accuses the audience of turning up two weeks too late. But my worries are unfounded. This double-act forms a classic, winning combination of the silly and the sane.

Ellis dances around, repeats Rose, and has a massive grin painted across his face throughout. Rose pretends to try and bring a semblance of seriousness to the hour-long farce, but essentially pulls the show further into the realm of insanity. Even the black sheet comes in handy, as Ellis spontaneously pretends to be a ghost (an example of Halloween entertainment), tripping over a chair and stumbling around the room in his self-imposed blindness. From this point on, I am won.

Utter chaos, but lots of laughs, Ellis and Rose may have just made my day. Even if they also made me hold a box that they claimed had a dead badger in it.

Ellis and Rose, Southsider. 25 Aug, 3.15pm.

Rhys Darby has the advantage of having an established fanbase, thanks to his character Murray Hewitt from hit comedy Flight of the Conchords. However, whilst Darby is a very funny man, I can’t help but feel his reputation as a comedian and his ability to fill venues is largely based on his association with the show.

Darby’s show is meant to be autobiographical, but his stand up is interrupted with scenes where he is one of the survivors in a spaceship after the apocalypse – something he was only given access to due to him being mistaken for his alter-ego, Murray. The spaceship scenes feel awkward and the show would have flowed better without them, while the Murray reference – although ironic – only serves to highlight Darby’s need to break away from this character. There is no denying Darby is a good comedian, and he has a unique selling point in his ability to team clownish physicality with spookily accurate sound effects. With a better show structure, Darby could finally break out from the shadow of Murray and go from being a good comedian to a great one.

Rhys Darby, Pleasance Grand, until the 27th, 8:00pm.

Rhythmic Circus defies expectations. If you’re only prepared for tap dance, the seven-piece band, complete with beat-boxer Aaron Heaton – who perhaps steals the show with his incredibly versatile voice – will come as a total surprise. The result: music and dance made equally significant in a breathtaking production.

Rhythmic Circus is upbeat, loud, and ambitious. Crossing genres. Mixing sounds. Incredible nuances and beats surface: the saxophone leaps to meet the bongos; a kaleidoscope of sounds blends in harmony.

The four dancers are mesmerising and energetic, especially Nick Bowman, with his consistently huge, infectious smile. Sometimes dancing in synchrony, other times individually, occasionally their different steps meld together to create complex, powerful new rhythms. Consistently challenging and changing the beat – dance echoing the rhythm of the sax, or Heaton’s voice – the hour was electrifying.

I wanted to shuffle-ball-change all the way home. Shame I didn’t pack my tap shoes!

Rhythmic Circus: Feed Don’t Fail Me Now!, Assembly George Square. 26-27 Aug, 3.40pm.

If anyone is dealing with East London hipsters with nuance, it’s The Hungry Bitches. There’s an itch about their new musical Facehunters: it’s satirical and expressive, but also steers clear of some of the more outdated, conventional musical forms. It’s more than hip; it’s forward-thinking.

A daring decision is to infuse the narrative with The Picture of Dorian Gray: whilst not as integrated as possible, it begins to turn predictable hero and villain plots into more twisted ones, granting gothic transgression a captivating theme. It just about holds together some questionable subplots – the narrative is sterling, but a few pennies short.

Frequently crowding the stage like some troupe of GaGa’s Little Monsters, the ensemble are a farcical success: derisive, sharp with social commentary and bringing some genius comic relief, but they awkwardly overshadow the leads somehow. Choreography gets repetitive and messy at times which, unfortunately, cannot always be excused as hipster drug-fuelled euphoria.

Underneath the messy distractions, it’s an impassioned venture. A topically fresh, synth-fuelled score sustains the nightmarish demand of this musical, addressing the crazed ‘live fast, die young’ mentality.

Facehunters, C. 26-27 Aug, 8.50pm.

Shane Koyczan: Talk Rocker was the first show to make me cry at the Fringe. There, I’ve said it. I’m not much of a crier normally. I have a reputation in my family for having a heart of stone. I didn’t even cry during the episode of The Royle Family where Nana dies. I’m basically subhuman.

But Koyczan’s poetry did something to me. He had a difficult childhood: raised by his grandparents, bullied throughout his youth, but don’t think for one second his poems are maudlin. They’re authentic, wise, wry and sparklingly funny, despite the heart-wringing content. Koyczan doesn’t ‘milk’ his past but utilizes it to form poems of rare depth and insight into the human heart, from first love and night terrors to the bonds of friendship and heavy weight of bereavement.

His delivery is understated, his quiet voice leaving audiences hanging on the lyrical beauty of his language. He seemed delighted that so many people turned up to hear him read. It’s touching to witness such a talented individual display genuine modesty. Shane Koyczan rocks.

Shane Koyczan: Talk Rocker, Underbelly. Until 27 August, 7.30pm.

Earlier this week Lauren Archer interviewed shock comedy trio Bad Bread about the ethics of offensive comedy. Here she gets an alternative argument from ‘nice’ comedian, Joel Dommett. 

Joel Dommett is adorable. He sits opposite me, clearly slightly uncomfortable, tugging at his sleeves and occasionally and unsuccessfully attempting eye contact. ‘I like to smile a lot,’ he smiles, ‘I’m a very optimistic person. So offensive stuff just isn’t really me. If I ever come up with offensive material I have to change it – it just doesn’t work with this smiley face.’

He has previously delivered material deemed offensive, he explains, but it just doesn’t work for him. ‘When you’re compering you do offensive material because it’s what the people booking you want. And it does work. But it just isn’t what I like doing. My show is all about bullying and I don’t think anyone should feel like they’re being bullied when they go and see comedy.’

So what about people who do perform distasteful routines? Dommett looks even more uncomfortable for a moment. Throughout the interview he makes statements about offensive material that he then retracts or rewords. It soon becomes apparent that he doesn’t even want to offend people who offend others for a living. After a considered pause, he says, ‘There is definitely a place for offensive stand-up. It needs to be there. Comedy should push the envelope so it has to be offensive at times. People who do that should be given full reign to do it. Otherwise, stand-up wouldn’t be the beautiful art form that it is. People like Frankie Boyle and, occasionally, Jimmy Carr have their place in comedy. I also have mine, as the smiley happy guy. They have theirs as grumpy, bitter, offensive guys.’

Despite being relatively tame, Dommett’s routine is very funny. In it, he shies away from anything that borders on the offensive. One anecdote containing a particularly controversial word involves him skirting around it, using a word suggested by the audience as a substitute. But, surely he too has been accused of being offensive at some point in his career? ‘Some audience members take elements of my show as offensive,’ he explains, ‘I start off with an anecdote involving a man in a wheelchair. It is in no way offensive but a surprising number of people are upset just because the person happens to have a disability. Even though I know it’s not offensive I worried a lot about telling that story. I knew that I’d be really uncomfortable telling it if there was a person in a wheelchair in the front row. And in that case, I really shouldnt be telling it a all. In the end though, I decided it was Ok. Actually, I did it with someone in a wheelchair in the front row a couple of days ago and it was all fine.’

Much like Bad Bread, Dommett says that the line lies in how something is said, rather than what is said: ‘You’ve got to come at comedy with integrity. Some people don’t do that and that’s when offensive comedy goes wrong. Offensive comedy is like a weapon. If used correctly, it can be used to great effect. If placed in the wrong hands it can be a disaster. If someone doesn’t know how to use offensive comedy it can ruin a night. Being directly offensive to an audience member, for example, can completely destroy a nice atmosphere at a show. It’s all in the way you say something. Someone can call someone else a prick in a beautiful, poetic way. Someone else could do it in a horrible way. I like to think that there is no line. I like to think that you can take it as far as you like, as long as you do it well.’

If someone gets too offensive – or crosses the line between offence and bullying – it can ruin an experience for an audience, Dommett tells me: ‘At the Fringe you should be running from one venue to another, experiencing incredible things. You shouldn’t be wasting time worrying about getting picked on. We’re the only country where stand-up comedy comes with that risk. In America people rush to the front row at comedy gigs and they love it. Here, the only people who rush to the front row are the people who want their mates to get picked on and embarrassed.’

He asks me if Ive seen anything that really offended me. I mention seeing LOL-ocaust in the programme (no, I will not let it go). His reaction is complete shock. For a moment, he forgets his neutral line: ‘Oh my god. That’s not ok. No stand-up comedian with any integrity would look a that title and think “wow, that’s a great idea.” A lot of stand-ups mess it up for themselves in the first few years because they use offensive material without any decency. You’ve got to be decent to handle offensive comedy. Those guys clearly aren’t ready to handle it and do it well,’ he muses. He looks genuinely troubled by the title. ‘But…it’s fine,’ he mumbles, returning for a moment to complete neutrality before shaking his head and saying more firmly: ‘Well, no. It’s not. But it makes the people doing it well look even better, I guess.’

Dommett insists that the problem is that offensive comedy ‘doesn’t suit him’, but some of his reactions suggest that something about the trend towards evermore upsetting material makes him uncomfortable. It seems like he’s just such a nice guy that he feels unable to risk upsetting anyone.

What is clear from our talk (and my earlier conversation with Bad Bread) is that nobody is really sure when offensive comedy stops being acceptable, or if it ever does. The consensus is that you can pretty much say anything if you say it in the right way. Dommett sticks firmly to this line…until he is presented with something that completely shocks him. So I’m still not sure where the line lies. Essentially, it all comes down to personal taste. Only you know when somebody has pushed past your boundaries from the amusing to the abusive. A crude joke can have a completely different impact on two different audiences, just as it can when delivered by two different people. Like much of comedy, the nature of offence is subjective. But whether it’s a storming out or a standing ovation, offensive comics are certainly getting a reaction.

Joel Dommett is on until the 26th August at 20:15 at Pleasance Courtyard. 

Waking up from a less than tranquil night exploring the nooks and crannies of Edinburgh I check my schedule; letting out a morose groan that has nothing to do with my rather delicate condition. “A tribute to 2,500 years of oration” in an hour and a half; impressive given the apparent amount of content.

I stumble unprofessionally into the venue, an ornate lecture room situated in Summerhall. Taking an unsteady seat on the wooden pews I’m momentarily haunted by the ghosts of fresher weeks past. Cursing my lack of paracetamol I silently plead for this to be a relatively painless ninety minutes.

My fears are far from assuaged when subtitles appear above the dimly lit figure, standing before a bank of microphones. A projected blackboard lists the historical speakers to be quoted; the lecture hall is revealing itself to be a depressingly appropriate setting for this “performance”.

And then he started singing Smells like Teen Spirit. I honestly couldn’t say how we got to this point. In fact I believe the majority of the audience would have a hard time recalling the journey to this surreal development. Fluent in four different languages, performer Dhaenens fashions a multilingual maelstrom of rhetoric, deftly splicing speeches to mesmerizing affect.

A disquietingly compelling rendition of Goebbels is nimbly interwoven with explosive declamations from a bombastic General George Patten, both speaking in 1945. Other discourses flow seamlessly in and out of hearing: a jovial Vanhecke, a composed Bin Laden and amongst others a beautiful re-enactment of Martin Luther King’s “Free at last” speech that had me blinking back tears. All of these touching and unsettling speeches are interspersed with musical interludes such as Nirvana and songs from West Side story which all feeling peculiarly fitting.

The piece has a dynamically organic quality, each sequestered segment amplifying the last, and building up a tremendous momentum. As the lights finally dimmed I found my headache had abated. I strode out into the early afternoon sun, my mind no longer aching but humming, synapses shimmering. Performed with unparalleled finesse Bigmouth is an unquestionably unique and powerful piece, and the best theatrical hangover cure known to man.

Bigmouth, Summerhall. 19-26 August, 12pm.