REVIEW: Bebe Cave: CHRISTBRIDE, EdFringe 2025 ★★★★

Following stellar reviews for last year’s silver-screen solo-farce The Screen Test, Bebe Cave returns to the EdFringe this summer with a brand new character comedy ripped straight from the dark ages – with a pertinent twist of modern-day politics. Crammed full of manic multi-roling, costumed caricatures, and some amazingly appalling accents, Bebe Cave: CHRISTBRIDE neatly disguises a deeply resonant critique of the barbarism of modern misogyny beneath a five-hundred years aged wine barrel of laughs.

Cave whisks you away into the medieval mundanity of Batilda’s humble merchant upbringings, dancing and dallying between jealous, spiteful village girls and ‘scrolling’ for potential suitors who pose a remarkable resemblance to the sometimes downright medieval offerings on most dating apps in the modern day. We’re given quite a while to settle into her mother’s scornful monologues and the recurring cast of an eclectic assortment of country bumpkins – demonstrating Cave’s immense roster of larger-than-life character accents.

Where the show really begins to shine through the stained glass is just after we are thrown into the first of Batilda’s impassioned, Blood of Christ-fueled visions with the clatter of iron bars, as we’re introduced to the Christbrides of the convent she will soon swear into – and a certain scouse saviour who left me absolutely cackling.

Cave scrambles through a jester’s closet of costumes, each of wildly varying quality (always to the benefit of the bit) – from Arthurian tabards to violet phallic headdresses, to an actually quite elegant nuns’ habit. This ever evolving outfit is met by similarly striking crenelated setpieces which enable some genuinely impactful moments of lighting design and shadow work.

CHRISTBRIDE had a plentiful (if packed) roster of farcical twists on medieval classic tropes bubbling alongside classic tween-angst cliches – leaving us, and at times Cave, a little breathless trying to follow along with the chaotic hilarity of it all. Historically backed, we’re constantly left balking at the mad realities of 16th century #ConventLife which seamlessly dips into poignant moments of biting feminist theory and criticisms of organised faith that never feel out of place, and often serve as the prophetic punchline to some wicked clowning. 

This early in the Fringe you’d easily forgive any first night fumbles to be ironed out after a couple performances, but I found the heart of slightly slapdash quickchanges and bombastic magic tricks just served to further bring home the genuine charm and energy of Cave’s performance – and despite her declaring to ‘never do that again’ after a particularly chaotic audience interaction, I do hope she does.

Constantly bouncing off of the room, Cave is at her best when she has the audience giggling, blushing, and moo-ing along to her careful puppeteering and sometimes wickedly heavy-handed conducting; I particularly enjoyed the impassioned front-row witch accusations, as well as my own time repenting sins in the confessional booth.

Wonderfully self-aware, whip-crackingly witty, and utterly fizzing with an almost feral energy that spread like the plague from her first appearance on stage, burning at the stake, Cave is a fierce, fiery, and astoundingly versatile stage presence and certainly not one to miss. 

Recommended Drink: Bebe Cave: CHRISTBRIDE is a crisp glass of communion wine – or the whole bottle – to fuel your very own fanatical fantasies.

You can catch Bebe Cave: CHRISTBRIDE in Pleasance Dome – Jack Dome on August 2nd-24th (not 12th), starting at 17:40 (60 mins). Tickets are available online through the EdFringe Online Box Office.