Gothenburg Fringe 2025 in review – Shame Show, Your Song, The Real Black Swann
Ceri Taylor was one of our star volunteers at Gothenburg Fringe, returning to Sweden year after year after arriving from the UK in 2022 as an Erasmus student. Alongside working hard throughout the Fringe, Ceri made sure to catch a variety of performances during the week and has compiled a series of reviews. Enjoy the second batch below.
Anyone love a storm? The perfect rainy day to snuggle down, get a hot drink and watch rubbish TV all day while it pours down outside. Fresh from Edinburgh Fringe, SkelpieLimmer brought Shame Show to the Gothenburg English Studio Theatre for a comedy sketch show in the backdrop of Storm Seamus and classic British TV programming.
In Northern Ireland, Seamus wreaks havoc and Adam and Stevie are stuck inside. The couple (Colm McCready and Fergus Wachala-Kelly) go on a long and technicolour journey to find self-acceptance with one’s sexual orientation.
Shame Show is primarily a comedy show but does nothing to diminish the importance of representation, patience and kindness that are so important to the queer community. Scores by parodied versions of British TV shows (including Straights in Their Eyes, Mr & Mr and Over the Rainbow) Shame Show reminds us that it’s not all drag queens and pride parades.
Queer people are just that – people. Its okay if you don’t feel ready to come out yet, or to live proudly even if you have come out. Everyone’s journey is different and it doesn’t make you any less.
Full of laughs, tears, drums and sock puppets, ShameShow is a fantastic performance and a rollercoaster of emotions.
Improv comedy duo Equally Alike returned to Gothenburg Fringe with the highly successful Your Song, a 60-minute comedy show inspired entirely by song choices from the audience. Each show is different, each show is unscripted, and each show is loads of fun!
Close your eyes, and think of a song. Any song. A song you have on your Spotify playlist right now. A song that reminds you of being a teenager. A song that your best friend played for you and now you can’t stop listening. If you’re brave enough to raise your hand, Christian Hjalmar and Michelle Haughton might just pick on you! Inspired by a lyric from the song of your choice, the show takes on a life of its own, carried by the comedic talents the artists on stage. The phrase ‘in the living years’ turned into a portal to an alternate dimension accessible only by the back entrance. That is to say, the anus.
Not one of those shows you can really describe – you have to experience it first-hand! These Gothenburg Fringe local legends will definitely be back in the future and you might well just get to see…Your Song!
William Dorsey Swann. Ring any bells? Don’t worry, we hadn’t heard the name either. Les Kurkandaal-Barrett brought his one-man show to Gothenburg Fringe for the first time, a comedic, poignant, characterful and queer history lesson with The Real Black Swann: Confessions of America’s First Black Drag Queen.
Holding the attention of an audience at Gothenburg English Studio Theatre is no mean feat, never mind doing so totally on your own! Kurkandall-Barret has no co-stars, using costume changes, various dialects and finger snaps to denote changes of scenes and character. William Dorsey Swann appears to Les in an anaesthetic haze and takes him through pivotal moments in his life as both queer and black living in the United States. Peppered with anecdotes from Les’s own personal life, Black Swann amplifies black voices, blatantly discusses racism and the ongoing fight for human rights.
Be prepared to laugh, sing, chant and (if you’re feeling particularly brave) join in with the show!
William Dorsey Swann is the first queer activist on record in the United States. He was born into slavery, threw infamous drag parties and his time of death is disputed. Had he been a different colour, we might know a lot more about him
