Goodbye Dandelion review – ode to a fabulous friendship with a 50-year age gap
This Guardian review covers Goodbye Dandelion, a storytelling show at Underbelly during the Edinburgh fringe, performed by sibling duo Maddie and Marcus Rice. The semi-fictional piece recounts Maddie's friendship with 87-year-old artist and piano teacher Darcy O'Shea, nicknamed "Dandelion", and touches on the theme of assisted dying that recurs across several shows at this year's fringe.
The show blends narration from Maddie with live piano and songs from Marcus, who provides comic relief through officialdom-inspired lyrics and some audience participation. The reviewer praises the warmth and wit of the storytelling but notes the piece lacks dramatic friction, working best when it explores how the friendship changed Maddie's own life. Directed by Katie Pesskin, the show runs at Underbelly, Edinburgh, until 30 August.
- Sibling duo's Edinburgh fringe show tells story of unlikely 50-year friendship
- Combines storytelling, piano and song about befriending 87-year-old Darcy O'Shea
- Reviewer finds it warm but lacking tension; runs until 30 August
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Goodbye Dandelion is one of many storytelling and theatre shows staged during the Edinburgh Fringe, the world's largest arts festival, which takes over venues across the Scottish capital every August. The show comes from siblings Maddie and Marcus Rice, who mix Maddie's spoken narration with Marcus's live piano and songs, a format common on the Fringe's cabaret and theatre circuit.
The piece is built around Maddie's real-life friendship with Darcy O'Shea, an 87-year-old artist and piano teacher known as "Dandelion". It is part of a wider cluster of shows at this year's Fringe that touch on assisted dying, a highly sensitive subject concerning whether terminally ill people should have a legal right to end their own lives with medical help, which is currently a live policy debate in the UK.
Reviews such as this one, published by the Guardian, are a routine part of Fringe coverage, helping audiences decide what to see among the thousands of shows on offer each year at Underbelly and other venues around the city.