Theatre review: Lauren Booth: Accidentally Muslim, Gilded Balloon Teviot, Edinburgh

When Lauren – then named Sarah – Booth began working at the top end of the British media in 1997, for publications including the New Statesman and the Mail on Sunday, she recounts walking onto jobs “as quick as you can say Tony Blair’s sister-in-law.”

Lauren Booth is a warm, engaging storyteller with an unusual tale

Lauren Booth: Accidentally Muslim, Gilded Balloon Teviot, Edinburgh * * *

Which – as the daughter of the actor Antony Booth and the half-sister of Cherie Blair – she was. Yet as it turns out, it was her position at the heart if the British establishment which ultimately brought an entirely altered perspective, as this solo memoir piece describes.

On a mission to cover the Palestinian elections for the Mail on Sunday in 2005, Booth went against type for most foreign journalists by getting out into the streets and speaking to the people. The hospitality she found among them set in motion a change of perspective which has lasted for the past decade and a half, including conversion from a rather non-committal Christianity to devout Muslim faith.

Until 26 August.

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