Edinburgh Festival Quotes

If you're not keen on crowds, it might be best to give Edinburgh a miss during festival time when it can get extremely busy.

I owe a great deal to Harold Hobson, doyen drama critic of the 'U.K. Sunday Times,' who championed me as Shakespeare's Richard II at the 1969 Edinburgh Festival.

When I used to do the Edinburgh Festival, there was a bunch of guys selling fresh oysters and I'd eat ten daily - marvellous.

I did a production of 'Journey's End,' an RC Sherriff play about World War I, at the Edinburgh Festival. I was 18 and it was the first time that people I knew and loved and respected came up to me after the show and said, 'You know, you could really do this if you wanted to.'

At 17 years old, STG took me under its wing and shared its resources and wisdom with me, even allowing me to take part in a show at the Edinburgh Festival. Without STG and the Ramshorn Theatre, I would not have found access to the world of drama that I later made my profession.

Edinburgh is a world city, visited throughout the year for its beauty and history, but in August, it is the City of Hope. There is something very exciting and romantic about performers of all shapes and sizes, honing their stuff for the biggest arts festival in the world.

I used to say Edinburgh was a beautiful actress with no talent. I thought it was just like a shortbread tin. I think that's because I did six Festivals in a row there, and I never saw the real Edinburgh, just a lot of deeply annoying Cambridge Footlights kids wanting to be actresses.

I'd done an Edinburgh show before, in 1981, called 'The Importance of Being Varnished' - I was in the pun trade at the time.

You gig and gig and wonder what your first Edinburgh show will be like, if people will like it, and when they do, it just feels like it validates the last few years of your life, and that you're on the right track.

Every year in Edinburgh, I end up waiting behind the curtain about to go on stage, and I have a moment of thinking, 'No one's told me what to do with this show. I've done exactly what I wanted. This is the biggest arts festival in the world, and all these people have shown up. Aren't I lucky?' It really is amazing.

My career has been a slow burn, so waiting to do the Edinburgh Festival was a smart move. If I'd spent a month there 10-15 years ago, there's no way anyone was gonna remember me.

The Edinburgh Fringe is a tough beast and you do whatever you can to get through it. But it's really the worst place to see comedians; everyone is so tense and nervous because it feels like Ofsted inspectors are out there.

I was acting before I was modelling, when I was very young, doing the Edinburgh Festival and that sort of stuff.

I have to say I like Edinburgh, but I'm not a big fan of the Festival - I like it but I'm not a massive fan.

Edinburgh is the most pressurised environment to do comedy. You get an hour. There's no compere. You'd better be on the money straight away; you've got journalists in.

The first time I saw Tim Minchin live, it was his 2008 show 'Ready for This?' in a very big room at the Pleasance during the Edinburgh fringe.

I feel at home in Scotland and go back whenever I can. I've played the Edinburgh Festival twice, and I get the train across the Forth Bridge to Lochgelly, just to see it.

I was doing a wee gig at the Edinburgh Fringe, and while I was walking down to the show from the train station, someone stopped and asked if they could get a picture with me. This was about six months before I released my first single as well, so my response was, 'Are you sure?'