REVIEW: Edinburgh Fringe – Dirty Great Love Story, Pleasance Dome
This review was originally written for and published by The Public Reviews
Writer: Richard Marsh and Katie Bonna
Director: Pia Furtado
The Public Reviews Rating: 
Calling something sweet, heartwarming and charming can be sounding the death knell for a production at the Fringe, but that might be this fantastic little piece of theatre’s unique selling point.
Richard Marsh and Katie Bonna combine drama and poetry in this rom-com in rhyme – Dirty Great Love Story, the ballad of two hopeful, hapless romantics who: “get drunk, get it on, and then get the hell away from each other.” This is a tale of what love is like in the real world: messy, awkward, complicated and fun. The story of falling in love with your best friend and all its embarrassments, and told from both (very different and highly amusing) sides.
The simple staging focusses the attention fully on the performance and Bonna and Marsh show great versatility throughout, seamlessly switching roles to play all the fully-developed supporting characters. The whole thing is done with great warmth and heart and by half way you could feel the energy of the audience willing them to get it together, and to its credit it manages to keep the belly laughs coming throughout.
If you are a fan of Richard Curtis movies then this has all the elements to please you and if you’re not then there’s the great one-liners, fine comic timing, inventive poetry and fabulous acting of Bonna and Marsh to delight in. This show will guarantee you’ll skip into the street with a smile on your face and your faith in human nature restored.
This is well-paced, sublimely well-written with a whole lot of heart and well-worth seeing. It’s nice to know that romance, however messy and complex as it is, is still alive and well in 2012. Highly recommended.