Free fringe campaigners threaten disaster, top venue director warns

The Assembly director William Burdett-Coutts said the festival rests on a fragile economy with more than 2,500 shows ranging from the smallest, cheapest productions to top professional shows. The Free Fringe movement should not carry “undue influence” he said.

An election battle over the governing board of the world’s biggest arts festival reaches a climax today as candidates for four seats campaigned via email, phone calls and social networking sites for their supporters to turn out.

Voting, overseen by Electoral Reform Services, closes at the Fringe Society’s annual general meeting at 11am today. It operates on the preference system, where votes by losing candidates are divided up until one candidate gets 50 per cent of the votes.

With an agenda that includes potentially slashing registration fees for the smallest performers, critics question how advocates of ticketless shows can run an institution financed by sales.

Mr Burdett-Coutts said: “The Fringe exists because it’s a very mixed economy, and it goes through from free fringe to the top professional end and to people making a living and going to further paid work outside Edinburgh.

“I think it would be disastrous for the Fringe. There needs to be a balance across the whole thing, but if they have undue influence the balance gets out of kilter.

“The Fringe, although everyone sees it and thinks it is marvellous and wonderful, is a very fragile animal. The economy of it is incredibly tight, and at the point that people think they can get it for nothing the top end of it will start to dilute.”

A personal contest between two of the Fringe’s best-known figures, the Stand Comedy Club director Tommy Sheppard, and the Underbelly venue’s co-director Charlie Woods, old sparring partners in Fringe politics, will be closely watched after some vitriolic exchanges. Mr Woods was thought to be favourite.

Candidate Sam Gough, director of Venue 150 at the EICC, said: “I think these are very important elections. The Fringe is a massive part of the city, and it’s for the Fringe board to get the right people on there to help guide performers and participants into future. This is my 20th Fringe and I have got so much out of being involved in it.”

He has contacted candidates on Facebook, Twitter and email, making his case but without aggressively pushing for votes.

But the Free Fringe – which has rapidly grown in size in recent years but accounts for about 20 per cent of shows and a much smaller audience share – could gain up to half the elected seats on the board.

Hundreds of Free Fringe performers have taken out the £10 voting membership of the Festival Fringe Society, swelling voting numbers to more than 700 in the past year.

One Free Fringe performer and candidate, Rachel McCluskey, yesterday said 50 per cent or more of new voters came from that sector, connected by emailing lists with 100s of names.

“We’re not some kind of lobby that’s lost any sight of what’s required here,” she said. “I would say people would have more to worry about if we do not get the seats.”

The number of free shows at the Fringe this year has grown to more than 600, but it is divided into two rival sectors – the PBH Free Fringe, founded by Peter Buckley Hill, with 326 shows at eight venues, and Free Festival, with 352 shows at eight venues.

The Fringe board candidates come from Mr Buckley Hill’s supporters.