12/08/2024
Delighted to see that Rick Conte’s Edinburgh Fringe show ‘An American Love Letter to Edinburgh’ at Scottish Storytelling Centre got another super 👌 🌟 🌟 🌟 🌟 4-star review from the Scotsman “We lean ever forward eager to know more … a surprisingly compelling hour”. You can read it here and find tickets for the shows which are at 1.15pm on odd numbered dates while on even days there are themed walking tours that expand on the story of Ben Franklin’s time in Edinburgh. Fit it into your calendar if you can!
https://linktr.ee/rickconte
This beguiling show keeps defying expectations at every turn so it’s actually more than a little disconcerting when it ends abruptly and you’re shaken from its spell.
Performed by Rick Conte, an American ex-pat who came to Edinburgh 35 years ago and never left, it’s a dual narrative that parallels Conte’s experiences in Edinburgh with those of Benjamin Franklin who made the journey in 1759.
If this sounds more than a little dry, it isn’t — although you will learn quite a bit. Conte had great success two years with an adaptation of The Man Who Planted Trees that employed his gifts as a puppeteer; here the only thing he brings to life is the past.
A funny, personable presence, Conte has a charming round-the-houses way of telling a story that knows the value of context. Detail is all-important as he evokes a bygone era when there was no internet, you could smoke on planes and London pubs called last orders at 10 o’clock.
It’s this last culture shock that originally compelled Conte to make his initial journey to Edinburgh where he arrives right in the middle of the Festival and eventually scores a drumming gig with an indie band.
This shouldn’t really parallel Franklin’s experiences hob-bobbing with the fathers of the Enlightenment but Conte keeps deftly switching between timelines so that they become the twin engines of the show, driving it forward.
You find yourself leaning forward eager to know what happens next, even though what happens next — at least to Conte — is not really all that remarkable. Perhaps that’s the point - life is what happens next. Relationships are strained and broken, children are born, stuff happens, history happens and still we lean ever forward eager to know more. It makes for a surprisingly compelling hour.
