Edinburgh Fringe 2026
The Mothman Cometh
Whisper Theatre
Genre: Absurd Theatre, Comedy, Solo Show, Surrealism
Venue: Just the Tonic @ The Caves
Festival: Edinburgh Fringe
Low Down
Richie Schiraldi from the Whisper Collective in Chicago brings the Mothman to the Caves in Cowgate, creating a wholly original and exciting participatory experience that isn’t to be missed.
Review
Already, word seems to have spread about the Mothman. As we line up to watch, the crowd is buzzing. The Caves are a beautiful space and the perfect location for the show; they seem like Mothman’s underground lair, and it’s hard to believe he doesn’t live there permanently. Richie Schiraldi as the Mothman is barely visible, just a striking pair of glowing red eyes in the darkness. He moves around jerkily, fluttering around the stage in a spookily accurate portrayal of a moth. His first act: to invite us, his minions, to join him in revelling in the comfort of the darkness. We all eagerly agree.
Quickly, Mothman breaks down the barriers between us and him and with each other through skilful crowd work, picking on fortunate audience members to come up and join him, asking us to contribute our own worries, fears and desires to the performance. Even while plunged in darkness, there’s nowhere to hide if the Mothman decides to fix his eyes on you – introverts, beware! – even so, I am not the most fond of audience participation, but Schiraldi creates an atmosphere of delightful playfulness that encourages connection with your weirdest, most primal self, until people are practically begging him to be the next person to take part in whatever is next, or screaming into the void together. He works fantastically with his audience, asking questions that manage to bring out hilarious answers that had us all rolling with laughter. Every so often, he bursts into song, something that could have felt awkward, but each of us found ourselves joining in and singing along in delight.
Surprisingly, the show moves through nihilism towards a more hopeful message, encouraging connection and community as the answer to resisting the call of the void, which was a fantastic way to work in a call to action that could have felt cheesy. Instead, it made me choke up a bit watching everyone come together to create something weird, wonderful and beautiful together. This is the best kind of experimental theatre, absolutely committed to the bit, and shaped completely by the energy of the audience. No doubt, the show that you will see will be completely different to the one that I did. Mothman feels like a parody of the nihilistic age we live in, breaking into song with emo anthems alongside ABBA, and every so often working in insightful messages about embracing our own darkness and dealing with fear and hopelessness.
No doubt word of mouth is already spreading about this show, so don’t miss out and make sure you grab your ticket before they sell out!
