REVIEW: A Costume Drama, Play the Field Productions, EdFringe 2026 ★★★★

I’ve left my Voi bike running, unable to park due to a glitching app and not enough signal. It’s all I can think about as Claudia Fielding takes the stage in A Costume Drama and the minutes start to rack up. It’s hard to compete with a tech company charging me 10p a minute for nothing, but Fielding makes an admirable attempt to pull me into the world of Yolkstone FC, the football club for whom her dad plays the body of their team mascot: Eddie the Egg.

It’s a strange premise, but it’s the strangeness that draws me in. I like where Fielding’s brain takes her, and that she allows herself to follow it through to the unexpected end. 

I am very much NOT a football girlie, and neither is our main gal Ella (despite the fact she does marketing for Arsenal FC) so it’s taking me a while to get into her world of football clubs and mascotry. A very left field choice for a one woman show, and one who’s inherent tribality feels hard to land in Edinburgh, the homeplace of Hibs. The fanfare sound effect that plays every time Ella mentions the Beautiful Game is by far my favourite joke of the show, and makes me wonder where else Anna Rastelli’s sound design could be put to even better comedic use. 

Ella’s dad has cracked his yolk, so it’s up to her, the prodigal daughter, to fill his boots in the 2026 Mascot Grand National. Things would be easier if she was a boy – apparently mascotry also follows the rules of primogeniture so only firstborn sons are allowed to inherit anthropomorphic suits. In classic bildungsroman fashion, Ella says no at first, only to watch her dad in action on Game Day and finally understand the beauty of his strange obsession: bringing people together in a united egg-based chant to the rhythm of a dustbin lid. Let the training commence.

Montages are for movies, not plays, I’ve always thought, but Fielding treats us to such a funny training montage it makes me question what I’ve been taught. The only thing missing is the egg costume! I realise that Fielding is saving donning Eddie the Egg for the play’s finale. This feels like a waste of such a well-made costume, and of all the potential physical comedy it would have lent this solo show. Also, given it’s on all the marketing material, it’s not exactly a dramatic reveal, which makes A Costume Drama feel like an hour of foreplay before we get what we all came here to see: Eddie the Egg in action!

For some reason unbeknownst to me, Eddie the Egg is inhabited by a genie with the voice of Gill Scott and the Mama Chicken who laid it. This feels like the moment we meet the mentor of Ella’s quest, the fairy godmother to her Cinderella, the Mr. Miyagi to her karate kid, who will guide her to victory. Only, it’s not. Gill Scott gets left by the wayside in a plot point that never comes to fruition. But Fielding makes up for this with an adept comic display of shadow puppetry.

Fielding voices all four characters in this oddball story with clarity and confidence, but it is her prosecco-loving, boy-obsessed roommate, and only friend, Charlotte, who I am most won over by. Whereas the ‘Proud Dad’ and ‘Gary the Boss’ feel like stock characters who exist to move the plot forwards, Charlotte is a well-played and well-observed example of character comedy, and Fielding appears to have the most fun bring her to life. It is Charlotte who ends up stealing the show with her perfect, huge breasts, in a plot twist I found unexpected, hilarious and heart-warming – just as the show’s promotional material promises. My only complaint is that we didn’t get to see enough of Fielding in her Eddie the Egg costume – it falls off almost as soon as she’s got it on.

Recommended Drink: A pint of Proescco.

Catch A Costume Drama from August 7-30 at ZOO Playground at 13:25 (60 mins). Tickets are available online through the EdFringe Online Box Office.