Six Champion Shows Set To Knock Your Socks Off This Edinburgh Fringe,
As #DANISH Celebrates Five Exhilarating Years!
Famous for showcasing some of the most critically acclaimed, thought provoking and daring international work in the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, #DANISH returns with five new shows to celebrate five exhilarating seasons of work from Denmark. Alongside this theatrical feast for the senses, the showcase’s Fringe First winning international hit THE INSIDER returns for an exclusive run at The Pleasance’s King Dome, allowing audiences and reviewers a second chance to enjoy this astonishing high-tech bank heist thriller based on a true story.
Committed to bringing the finest performance work from Denmark to the world via the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, this year’s showcase includes a line-up of daring women taking on hard wood and big balls, a dashing Dane in a dinner suit keen to ply you with cocktails, a soloist exploring belonging through her Danish/Greenlandic heritage, a man wrestling internal demons from his armchair and a brand new physical theatre company taking Europe by storm.
A highlight of this year’s new works is the return of the award-winning Danish company HIMHERANDIT Productions, which captivated audiences in 2023 with the powerful MASS EFFECT at Summerhall. This year, they return to Edinburgh with the deeply moving performance CHAMPIONS at Pleasance.
#DANISH continues in 2025 with support from the Danish Ministry of Culture and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. This is a multi-year collaboration between the founder of the #DANISH initiative, production company WILDTOPIA and the Embassy of Denmark in the UK.
This year the #DANISH showcase is proud to introduce:
Danish Theatre Award Nominee Champions A Heroic Internal Struggle
Hot on the heels of Edinburgh Fringe 2023’s sensational Summerhall success MASS EFFECT, HIMHERANDIT Artistic Director and Choreographer Andreas Constantinou introduces a work so strikingly different that the juxtaposition of both pieces marks a defining moment in his career so far. Award-nominated Constantinou’s Champions is a deeply personal, emotionally charged performance delving into themes of family dynamics, identity, loneliness, and resilience. This impactful 30-minute piece seamlessly blends theatre, live art, video projections, and haunting audio to immerse audiences in a vivid portrayal of personal struggle and self-acceptance.
In Champions, Constantinou courageously confronts his strained relationship with his homophobic father, stern mother, and his own vulnerabilities. Seated silently before the audience, Constantinou allows recorded conversations with his parents and therapist to unveil layers of grief, rejection, and emotional turmoil. This intimate narrative creates an intense, reflective atmosphere that engages viewers profoundly.
Dynamic and unsettling, the performance’s set erupts with striking video projections depicting an intense wrestling match between two men, an evocative metaphor for Constantinou’s internal battles. These visuals alternate with quiet stillness, mirroring the tension between silent endurance and inner chaos.
A Greenlandic Inspired Dance Of Belonging And Becoming
Drawing on her joint Greenlandic Inuit and Danish heritage, performer Sarah Aviaja Hammeken brings a timely and enchanting work of belonging and becoming to the Edinburgh Fringe. Her work, SOIL, is a compelling dance performance deeply rooted in Greenlandic traditions, exploring identity, language, and cultural belonging. Through the resonant movements and rhythms of Kalaallisut, this solo performance by Hammeken herself embodies a powerful exploration of cultural connection beyond spoken words and geographical boundaries. A poetic and physical journey of self-discovery, SOIL illuminates the intimate relationship between language, body, and heritage. It invites audiences to experience the beauty and challenges of communication in new ways. Produced in collaboration with Dansehallerne.
17 Arists, 13 Countries, One Body.
A family friendly show for both hardcore circus lovers and artistically inclined audiences alike. The show explores authentic and profoundly touching topics as it leads their audience through emotional highs and lows and ultimately leaves it joyous and excited with a new outlook on how far human collaboration could take our society. Since premiering debut show The Genesis less than a year ago, fledgling acrobatic company The Copenhagen Collective has dazzled audiences across Europe with this moving contemporary work that uses breathtaking feats of circus artistry to explore themes of togetherness, conflict, integration and collaboration, all while leaving audiences gasping for more.
Female Power In A World Of Hard Wood And Big Balls
From the Danish dance company DON GNU, who brought you compelling macho dance off Tennis and acclaimed exploration of modern masculinity M.I.S. – All Night Long, comes a girly K.I.S.S.
Don’t let yourself be fooled by the lip smacker of a title, however, because this love letter to the trials of feminism and meeting men on their own terms comes with a powerful punch of energy and imagination from female performers, Nadja Bounenni, Giulia Quacqueri & Paulína Šmatláková.
Translated to Women in Socks and Sandals for the Edinburgh Fringe from its original Danish title K.I.S.S (Kvinder I Sokker Og Sandaler), the show explores what happens when women enter a world created by men. What is it like to be expected to act like the men around them? Is it possible for them to find their own expression in world of raw physicality, ego battles, and cheesy dad humour? Or is the air coming out of the balloon? What does female power in a world of hard wood and big balls look like? Produced in collaboration with Bora Bora.
A Contemporary Wolf Of Wall Street
An internationally critically acclaimed Scotsman Fringe First Winner in 2023, The Insider returns to give audiences a second chance to see this incredible visual phenomenon live. Based on a real scandal, it charts the story of a young bank lawyer sucked into a criminal financial network, intent on stealing £50 Billion from treasuries around Europe. With superb acting, an extraordinary visual and binaural soundscape that enhances the building tension and a compelling script exploring greed and large-scale financial fraud, this show is guaranteed to send chills down your spine!
‘Unexpectedly gripping, brilliantly inventive and technically ground-breaking… an immersive masterpiece‘
★★★★★ Liam Rudden, Must See Theatre
‘It would be a crime to avoid a play that manages to create so specific and unique a vision’ ★★★★ British Theatre Guide
★★★★★ Theatre-News
LATE NIGHT LEHRER – With Caspar Phillipson
When You’re Up To Your Neck In Shit – It’s No Use Hanging Your Head
Dashing Dane Caspar Phillipson, invites you to join him for a naughty Copenhagen cocktail of absurd current affairs, the thrilling life of a middle-aged married man, and Tom Lehrer classics in Late Night Lehrer. Edinburgh Fringe 2025 sees Phillipson premiering the English language version of the play, which has been playing in Copenhagen, as well as touring Denmark, for the past five years. Phillipson is your late-night host at the piano, taking a sharp look at international current affairs and life’s absurdities through the lens of famous musical satirist Tom Lehrer’s shockingly timely songs. A morbid yet dazzlingly entertaining evening of satire and music. As Caspar’s Danish grandma used to say: ‘When you’re up to your neck in shit – it’s no use hanging your head’.
Danish Cultural Attaché Lone Britt Christensen, from the Danish Embassy in London has followed
the work behind #DANISH since 2018. She says:
“This year has an incredibly strong line up of Danish theatre and dance organisations, and the Danish Embassy is again this year proud to collaborate with Wildtopia on supporting all the Danish talent at the Edinburgh Fringe. This platform has built up a reputation of showcasing high quality work from Denmark. So don’t miss it!”
Arts Entrepreneur and Founding Producer of #DANISH, Karen Toftegaard said:
“The role of art in the world is more important than ever. With #DANISH, we are not only creating export opportunities – we are strengthening Denmark’s cultural connections and positioning Danish performing arts in an international context, where art becomes a catalyst for dialogue and relationships. And we simply love meeting people from Scotland and the whole world in Edinburgh every year.”
#DANISH is the Danish showcase at Edinburgh Fringe 2025 presented in a collaboration by founding producer WILDTOPIA and The Embassy of Denmark in the UK – supported by The Danish Ministry of Culture and Foreign Affairs.
Go to www.danishedfringe.com for more information.
LISTINGS INFORMATION
CHAMPIONS
Venue: Pleasance, EICC, Pentland
Dates: 31st Jul – 16th Aug
Time: 20:30
Duration: 45 min
Ticket Price: From £10
Age Guidance: 16+
Event Warning: Contains Nudity
Reviews From: 31st Jul
SOIL
Venue: Dance Base
Dates: 1st – 17th Aug (Not 4th, 11th)
Time: 15:50
Duration: 45 min
Ticket Price: From £15.50
Age Guidance: 14+
Reviews From: 1st Aug
THE GENESIS
Venue: Assembly, Main Hall
Dates: 31 July – 25 Aug (not 6, 11, 18 Aug),
Time: 12:30pm
Duration: 60 min
Ticket Price: From £10.50
Event Warning: Strobe Lighting
Reviews From: 31st Jul
WOMEN IN SOCKS AND SANDALS
Venue: Zoo Southside
Dates: 1st – 10th Aug
Time: 13:20
Duration: 60 min
Ticket Price: From £16
Age Guidance: 12+
Reviews From: 1st Aug
Prerun: Aberdeen Performing Arts – International Season, 30. Jul
Venue: Pleasance, Pleasance Dome, King Dome
Dates: 30th Jul – 23rd Aug
Time: 13:30
Duration: 65 min
Ticket Price: From £10
Age Guidance: 16+
Reviews From: 30th Jul
LATE NIGHT LEHRER – With Caspar Phillipson
Venue: Greenside, George Street, Lime
Dates: 1st– 9th, 18th -23rd Aug
Time: 20:45
Duration: 60 min
Ticket Price: From £7
Age Guidance: 14+
Reviews From: 4th Aug
For more information, images, filming, interviews and press tickets please contact:
Michelle Mangan PR hello@michellemangan.com | 07979227909
NOTES TO EDITORS
The Embassy of Denmark in the UK aims to ensure the highest possible quality and best visibility for
Danish arts and artists, including securing the right partnerships with British cultural institutions,
artistic collaborators and stakeholders.
#DANISH is the Danish showcase at Edinburgh Fringe 2025 presented in a collaboration by founding producer WILDTOPIA and The Embassy of Denmark in the UK – supported by The Danish Ministry of Culture and Foreign Affairs.
WILDTOPIA is a creative production and promotion company with a mission to connect art and
human beings – unfolding the values in international meetings and collaborations. Since 2020
WILDTOPIA has been producing the #DANISH showcase at EdFringe. In 2018 the company initiated
the first Nordic collaboration at EdFringe. In 2021 the company founded the digital first festival
RE:LOCATIONS as a response to a world where old ways of working internationally weren’t possible
and needed to change. WILDTOPIA is committed to continued exploration of working more sustainably across borders.
DON GNU is a guarantee of physical action theatre and dance combined in a playful and poetic power universe! The company was founded in 2010 by the two choreographers Jannik Elkær and Kristoffer Louis Andrup, who also constitute the artistic duo at the helm of DON GNU. Today the company is one of the most touring companies in Denmark. In addition to extensive tour activities in Denmark, DON GNU has also toured in all the Nordic Countries, South Korea, Canada, big parts of Europe and Cuba.
The company’s name is built around the paradox embedded in the name DON GNU. Don as an individual, and Gnu (wildebeest) as a herd animal, the constellation of both the individual and the collective creates the dynamism, experimentation and development-basis for the ideas that are the hallmark of DON GNU productions.
Caspar Phillipson has played President Kennedy in five different international movie productions and has toured the world as Hamlet in The Tiger Lillies perform Hamlet. Played Archibald Craven in the Edinburgh Festival Theatre’s production of The Secret Garden in December 2010.
Sarah Aviaja Hammeken (DK/GL) is the founder of AVIAJA Dance, a platform where she explores and develops her choreographic practice. Her artistic journey is driven by a profound interest in the intersection of the physical body, dance, and society, often drawing inspiration from her Inuit (Greenlandic) heritage.
Andreas Constantinou is a performance artist, entrepreneur, and artistic director of HIMHERANDIT PRODUCTIONS and Q&A Studios (Queer Art Studios Aarhus).
Andreas Constantinou graduated from Trinity Laban in 2003 and worked with Punch Drunk as a devising performer creating roles for productions such as Sleep no more and The Fire Bird Ball between 2003-2005. In 2006 Andreas decided to focus primarily on his own artistic practice and founded the company HIMHERANDIT. He has toured his artistic work extensively under the company’s name in theatres and festivals throughout Europe.
Between 2013-2018 he created THE GENDER HOUSE PROJECTS: a series of 9 artistic chapters that tackled themes of gender, sexuality and identity from different artistic perspectives. Several of these performances won and were nominated for numerous awards and were selected as Aerowaves top twenty dance works. In 2018 Andreas founded THE GENDER HOUSE QUEER ARTS FESTIVAL and between 2019-2021 created the award-winning performances of MASS EFFECT & CHAMPIONS.
Most Andreas has opened Q&A Studios (Queer Art Studios Aarhus) a queer arts residency centre for local, national and international queer artists.
Andreas was an established dance teacher and lecturer between 2003-2013. He was the Head of Contemporary Dance Division at Klassiski Listdansskolinn, Reykjavik, Iceland from 2006 – 2009, and taught at Laban, The Place and Iceland Academy of the arts. He was Head of the Dance at Performers House, Denmark between 2009 – 2013.
HIMHERANDIT are an award-winning performance company led by the artistic vision of Andreas Constantinou and are one of the leading Queer Art Companies in Denmark.
HIMHERANDIT’S artistry fluctuates between genres of performance art, physical theater, immersive theater, dance and large-scale video installations. The company develops projects that push, provoke, and engage audience into discourse around often difficult to approach social subjects.
Over the course of the last ten years the company has supported the development of queer art in Denmark with professional productions, community engagement projects, The GENDER HOUSE Queer Art Festivals and most recently the opening of Q&A Studios – Queer Art Studios Aarhus, which is both home to the company and a residency center that supports local, national and international queer art makers.
The Copenhagen Collective Hailing from Copenhagen, Denmark, and comprised of 17 artists from 13 different countries, the Copenhagen Collective is one of the most vibrant and exciting new companies on the contemporary circus scene. Created in April 2024, the company premiered their first show on July 4, 2024. We are 17 artists from 13 different countries.
Teater Katapult has existed since the mid-90s and arose out of a desire to treat current themes from the world that surrounds us; kick off debates, provoke thought and turn off the audience’s autopilot. That is why Katapult has also from the start been the writing theatre with a focus on the text that forms the basis of the performing arts.Funders:Danish Art’s Foundation, Aarhus Kommunes Kulturudviklingspulje, Wilhelm Hansen Fonden, Aarhus Stiftstidendes Fond.
Kelly Lacey & Love Books Tours 