HALBUM

Edinburgh Festival Fringe 2024

Aleksandr Popov 

“50 Shades of Bouncer”


After more than two decades in the buzzing night life of his home town of Tallinn, Aleksandr Popov takes his place in the spotlight and lets the
inner demons loose through the cracks in his life-long moulded armour
of wit and sarcasm.

“A long time has passed since I first stepped on the door. But one thing I still remember like it was yesterday – cold was the night when it all started. During the days that followed that night, I became many things... I graduated four colleges in three different countries earning degrees in law, politics and pedagogy. I worked manual labour, trained in a public sector, was an in-house lawyer, became a teacher and somehow even a college professor. I even ran for parliament! For I am the legion of 50 Shades of Bouncer.”

50 Shades of Bouncer is an origin story of a boy who dreamed, despite the viral antagonising hatred towards his differences, and grew up to be a man of many facets. Come night he can still hold the fort at the door, but during the day he is so much more than what they expected him to ever be!

5th-25th of August @ 1930
Media tickets available
Running time: 60 minutes
Suitability: 12+
Alchemist Cocktail Bar and Restauramt – The Fallow, Venue 409
51 George Street, EH2 2HT
Pay What You Can

Aleksandr Popov 

“Post-Soviet Upbringing”


13th day of independence from dreadful occupation by USSR. Little boy arrives to his first day of school to find out that he is anything but ordinary – he is part of a problem. And seems that this problem is never going away – no matte how hard he tries, he will forever be seen as “the other amongst his own and one of their own amongst the others”. And so the tale of “post-soviet” upbringing begins!

“Dorky and chubby "half-blood" kid born out of the Cold War era “darkness” of the USSR goes on to witness the rebirth of his homeland through the edgy yet sheepishly silly 90s to become a trinity of degrees sporting college professor and school teacher who moonlights as a bouncer and comedian. Welcome to the rocky road of an Eastern-European youth on his way to greatness. What you will hear is silly, shocking and sugar-coat free. In one way or another, everything in this tale of two clans has happened to the narrator. And somehow he’s still standing!”

Post-Soviet Upbringing is the tale of two clans that affects the the life of the storyteller. Estonian on his mothers side, Russian on his fathers side he becomes a “smoothy” of tumultuous 90's! Whatever he does is never good enough for one or the other of his “families”. And in the end he finds himself joyfully lost in the “otherness” of his cultural roots.

14 th-25th of August @ 1200
Media tickets available
Running time: 60 minutes
Suitability: 12+
Laughing Horse @ West Port Oracle, Venue 75
27 West Port, EH1 2LD
Pay What You Can
Laughing Horse Free Festival 2024