Allison Engel
7 Jul 2026
USC School of Dramatic Arts Students and Alumni perform at the world's largest performing arts festival
The world’s largest arts festival, the Edinburgh Fringe, is known for launching unknown plays, musicals, individual actors and comedians from obscurity to international acclaim. Think Fleabag or Baby Reindeer, two recent examples.
It’s an open access festival, meaning no vetting or gatekeeping. It attracts hopefuls from more than 60 countries who bring nearly 4,000 productions to the Scottish city during August, staging them in venues carved out of every possible space in the city.
The USC School of Dramatic Arts (SDA) has a storied history at the Edinburgh Fringe.
In 1966, it became the first American theatre school invited to the festival, and for 23 seasons, Festival Theatre USC-USA sent troupes of students and alumni who performed plays in repertory. Today, that tradition continues with a new generation of Trojan artists. This summer, Dean Emily Roxworthy will return to Edinburgh to support what is shaping up to be one of USC’s largest groups of students and alumni participating in the festival in decades.
Current students make their Fringe debut
Dozens of Trojans, both current students and alumni, are taking productions to the 2026 festival. Many are Fringe first-timers, including the 12-member cast and 8-member crew of It’s a Struggle Coming Out, “a campy crusade of repression, romance, and religious hysteria” that is getting its international debut. The cast and crew are all current students from Dramatic Arts, as well as from the USC School of Cinematic Arts and the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism.
The play was written by Cinematic Arts student Ben Berman, a junior this fall, who developed parts of it in his SDA playwriting classes with Professor Oliver Mayer. It was chosen by the Los Angeles Theatre Initiative as one of the productions it is helping bring to the Fringe. It is directed by rising BFA in Acting for Stage and Screen Junior Alec Schwartz. Several members of the creative team successfully applied for and received funding through the USC School of Dramatic Arts to support their participation in the Edinburgh Fringe.
Berman says there’s an anti-commercial aspect to the Fringe, so playwrights are free to use an authentic voice. He says: “We have costumes, but no set other than black boxes. To have a play where so much can happen using really nothing is what excites me about the Fringe.”
Paige Iacobacci, who also will be a junior at Cinematic Arts, is the on-campus producer for the play. For her, the opportunity to take in the wealth of other offerings in Edinburgh is a big draw. “Seeing stuff at your school is great, but seeing original work from around the world is really cool,” she says. “Sparking your creativity from being around a bunch of other creative people is why I’m really excited to go and be inspired.”
Alumni take the stage
An SDA alum is taking an ambitious production to the Fringe in his first Edinburgh adventure. David Magidoff (BA ’04) will bring his improvised musical comedy Making Love with David Magidoff to Scotland. Last fall, Magidoff brought the show to SDA in a sold-out performance in the Bing Theatre, and he’s been performing sold-out shows of Making Love at the Elysian Theater in Los Angeles for three years. Just weeks before opening in Edinburgh, Magidoff’s show was featured in The Guardian’s roundup of essential comedy at the 2026 Edinburgh Fringe.
In Making Love, a new musical is created on the spot using details from a guest star’s real-life love story. For his 15 Fringe performances, Magidoff will be joined by fellow improvisers, as well as UK rock stars Fran Healy (from the band Travis) and Tim Burgess (from The Charlatans), six performers from the British game show Taskmaster, and Ayoade Bamgboye of Saturday Night Live UK. They will take turns at different performances, adding to Making Love’s creative mayhem.
“I don’t think I would do all this except the Fringe is the pre-eminent theatre festival in the world,” says Magidoff. “It’s the mountaintop for improv.”
There are at least three solo shows going to the 2026 Fringe starring SDA grads. Megan Tomei (MFA Acting ’24) will give 21 performances of Spin Queen, her dark comedy about a spin instructor, all while pedaling on a stationary bicycle for 45 minutes. She found her director, Jennesy Herrera, through a recommendation from a fellow SDA student, Adi Eshman (MFA Dramatic Writing ’23), a playwright whose work has been directed by Herrera. “For me, the Fringe emphasizes creating your own work, and taking ownership of your work,” says Tomei.
Her biggest hurdle so far has been renting a stationary bike in Edinburgh. She’d like to teach a few spin classes while there – “good marketing opportunities,” she says.
Quaz Degraft (MFA Acting ’25) will be starring in In the Black, his solo semi-autobiographical dark comedy about an ambitious Black accountant on Wall Street. It’s his second time bringing the play to Edinburgh. Last summer, it earned rave reviews, and Degraft received the Broadway Baby Bobby Award, one of the festival’s honors recognizing outstanding productions. This year, In the Black moves to Daisy at Underbelly Bristo Square, one of the Edinburgh Fringe’s premier performance venues.
Degraft credits SDA Professor Luis Alfaro’s solo performance class with teaching him how to structure a solo play and physicalize it, and says Alfaro has been a sounding board as he has refined the work.
As a returning performer, Degraft knows that marketing your show in Edinburgh is a skill in itself. Last year, his first two shows had only three or four people in the audience, so he quickly shifted into promotion mode to build attendance. While on the street passing out flyers each day, he wore the orange prison jumpsuit he wears at the top of his play to make himself stand out. “Flyering” is a fundamental Fringe activity to drum up audiences, and the street scene of flyer-wielding performers is wild, like Hollywood Boulevard’s characters “on steroids,” Degraft says.
“The Fringe is a marathon, but it was one of the best experiences of my life,” he enthuses.
Another SDA alum, Michelle “Midge” Lema (BA ’07), will star in her solo show, Bean vs. The Robots, billed as “a weird little musical about grief.” Multi-hyphenate Lema, a Fringe veteran as an actor, writer and producer, first performed at the festival as a high school student.
She will be directed by Riley Rose Critchlow (BFA Acting ’14), who has acted, produced, or directed in productions seen at four previous Fringe festivals. This summer, in addition to Bean vs. The Robots, she is directing The Second Best School Shooting, a production already generating buzz. The dark comedy is about two friends struggling to navigate surviving a school shooting that is overshadowed by a worse school shooting on the same day. It was developed with input from hundreds of students, teachers, and school shooting survivors. Its executive producer is film and TV heavyweight Adam McKay.
Critchlow first attended the Fringe in 2016 as an actor and producer in a month-long run of the play Carnal Desire. “I absolutely fell in love with the festival,” she says. “Edinburgh is a beautiful city where thousands of people fly in from around the world to see a weird little black box show. It is so creatively fulfilling.”
Critchlow is looking forward to seeing the work that other SDA actors and creatives are bringing this year. “The USC network is so strong and supportive,” she says.
Dean Roxworthy plans to attend performances of SDA students and alumni and explore opportunities for strengthening ties between the School and the influential entertainment festival.
“The Edinburgh Fringe has long been part of USC’s history, and this new generation of artists is building on that legacy,” says Roxworthy. “The number of students and alumni participating this year reflects the extraordinary creative collaboration and entrepreneurial spirit that define our School. I’m looking forward to cheering on our Trojans, and seeing them share their work with audiences from around the world.”
For those planning a trip to Edinburgh in August, here is information about each of the plays mentioned above. We know there may be other Trojans performing at the Fringe or attending this summer. If so, we’d love to hear from you.
USC productions at the 2026 Edinburgh Fringe
It’s a Struggle Coming Out – Current USC Students
Comedy, theatre, LGBTQ+
55-minute performance
6 performances from Aug. 8 – Aug. 13
Venue: Upper Theatre at theSpace @ Niddry Street
About: The production is directed by Alec Schwartz and features a 20-member creative team from the School of Dramatic Arts, School of Cinematic Arts and Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism. It had its premiere in March at the Thymele Arts performing space in Los Angeles, and is being produced by the Los Angeles Theatre Initiative (LATI), an organization that helps develop new work to be shown at the Edinburgh Fringe. LATI offers scholarships to Edinburgh-bound creatives.
Making Love with David Magidoff – David Magidoff (BA ’04)
Comedy, improv, musical comedy
One-hour performance
15 performances from Aug. 7 – Aug. 23
Two venues: Gordon Aikman Theatre at Assembly George Square
Studio Two at Assembly George Square Studios
About: Magidoff’s team going to Scotland includes three well-known improvisers from The Groundlings (Stephanie Courtney, Kimberly Condict and Matt Cook), the rapper Propaganda, cellist Karen Hall, piano player and poet Josh Cake, and a photographer. They will be joined at various performances by Fran Healy of the band Travis, Tim Burgess, lead singer of the band The Charlatans, six cast members from the TV show Taskmaster and Ayoade Bamgboye of the UK version of SNL. Last fall, Making Love played to enthusiastic audiences at USC’s Bing Theatre before beginning its Edinburgh Fringe run.
Spin Queen – Megan Tomei (MFA Acting ’24)
Dark comedy, physical theatre, solo show
50-minute performance
21 performances from Aug. 7- Aug. 29
Venue: Jade Studio at Greenside @ George Street
About: Tomei wrote this play in 2025-26, using her personal experience as a professional spin instructor. The play shows her character spiraling into a manic breakdown as she expounds on the fitness industry, beauty standards and running from an abusive relationship. Tomei will be taking it off-Broadway at the Chain Theatre and to the Connecticut One Act Festival in late July before heading to Scotland.
In the Black – Quaz Degraft (MFA Acting ’25)
Dark comedy, solo show, theatre
One-hour performance
26 performances from Aug. 5 – Aug. 31
Venue: Daisy at Underbelly, Bristo Square
About: Degraft worked as an accountant in private equity on Wall Street before deciding to become an actor and playwright. His play draws on his financial industry knowledge as his character “navigates power, class, and identity in a system never built for him.” This year’s version is almost twice as long as last year’s, and he’s brought on a lighting designer and sound designer. They won’t be going to Edinburgh with him, but will be with him to the International Black Theatre Festival in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, where he will perform In the Black before the Fringe.
Bean vs. The Robots – Midge Lema (BA ’07)
Musical theatre, solo show
50-minute performance
21 performances between Aug. 7 – Aug. 29
Venue: Theatre 2 at theSpace @ Surgeons’ Hall
About: Lema’s character, Bean, is a space traveler trapped in her spaceship and has lost her memories. Singing sad songs brings them back. It’s billed as a “sci-fi exploration of grief.” Bean vs. The Robots is the third solo show Lema has written and performed, but her first musical. She performed it in June at the Hollywood Fringe and in workshops. It’s directed by fellow SDA alum Riley Rose Critchlow.
The Second Best School Shooting – directed by Riley Rose Critchlow (BFA Acting ’14)
Dark comedy, theatre, new writing
One-hour performance
23 performances from Aug. 5 – Aug. 30
Venue: Baby Grand at Pleasance Courtyard
About: Written by teacher-turned-playwright Alice Stanley Jr., this play uses macabre humor to confront the difficult truth of school shootings. It’s produced by Broadway producer Jessica Green Harrison and actor/producer Matthew Lillard, and executive produced by Academy Award winner Adam McKay. The playwright developed the play with young people who contributed their “raw, terrified, and – against all odds – hilarious perspectives.” It is directed by Fringe veteran Riley Rose Critchlow.