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This summer, I had the incredible opportunity to travel to Edinburgh, Scotland with my professor and advisor, Associate Professor of Theater Sarah Kozinn, as well as two student colleagues, Caroline Cole and M Barariu. I was there to conduct research at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, which is one of the largest international theater festivals in the world, and to tackle the question of how live performance has changed in the years following the COVID-19 pandemic. 

This research was possible thanks to the Richter Faculty-Led Research Projects grant, which gives financial support to experts doing research abroad in their field. When I started at ��«Ӱҵ, I had never done research of any kind and didn’t really intend to—I simply didn’t know that it was possible in my field or what it would look like. Luckily, Richter proved me wrong and gave me the chance to learn about the important role academic research holds even in a more subjective world like theater and performance. 

Together, our research group attended over 40 theatrical performances across a wide variety of genres, venues, and cultural origins. We saw performers from over six different countries and three different continents, and were able to interview artists from across all walks of life. I took detailed notes on every performance, conducted interviews with artists and creatives, and wrote three performance analyses. A performance analysis isn’t quite like a traditional review: I wasn’t giving a show a rating out of five stars or saying whether I loved or loathed it. Rather, I dissected the how and why of the artist’s creation, using a more academic lens to critique the work. We then created a  to publish our analyses and share our Fringe experience with others. 

When I started at ��«Ӱҵ, I had never done research of any kind and didn’t really intend to—I simply didn’t know that it was possible in my field or what it would look like. Luckily, Richter proved me wrong.

At times it was challenging to keep up with the pace of the festival atmosphere. One minute I’d be crying my eyes out over an emotional drama, the next laughing my head off at a clown routine. Yet the magic of being in a city where time stopped and everyone ate, slept, lived and breathed theater meant that my excitement and gratitude for being there never waned. Our post-show debriefs also helped me ground myself after a performance, and they became one of my favorite parts of the experience. We walked basically everywhere, so we had a lot of conversations on foot heading to our next show, or while grabbing a quick bite to eat. Talking about the performance I had just seen with Dr. Kozinn, Caroline, and M was a great way for us to bounce ideas off of each other, or share things we’d noticed that the others hadn’t. 

The Edinburgh Fringe was a learning experience in so many ways. I learned that while quantitative figures are important, qualitative research is not “less valuable” data, especially in a nuanced field like theater. I learned how to do interviews with complete strangers. We documented emerging trends, like an increase in audience-centered practice, paradocumentary, and the use of projection or video-based aides. And I got to see firsthand thousands of people bringing their shows to share them with an international community. 

As I prepare to graduate into a world seven years removed from the COVID-19 pandemic, this experience showed me a career in theater isn’t just possible, it’s practical. After graduating, I want to continue writing and acting with my peers and friends, with the long-term goal of creating a production company together. The Edinburgh Fringe gave me the opportunity to watch people just like me doing exactly that, working on their skills and building their brands with their fellow creatives and their friends. I’m so incredibly grateful that I was able to be a part of it.

Elizabeth is a double major in Spanish Studies, and Theater and Performance Studies.

Top Image: Hannah Reilley’s ROLEPLAY was one of several wonderful one-person shows we got to see.