09 March,2026 11:51 AM IST | Mumbai | Athulya Nambiar
Nigel Miles-Thomas and David Hoskin
As the Mumbai Fringe Festival gears up to welcome international performers, two distinct theatrical worlds will unfold on stage- a nostalgic Sherlock Holmes tale and a playful horror-comedy mime. British performers Nigel Miles-Thomas and David Hoskin spoke to mid-day.com about their shows, the spirit of fringe festivals, and what audiences can expect.
David Hoskin's show Haunted House blends comedy, horror and physical theatre, inviting audiences into a classic gothic scenario.
"Haunted House is a comedy-horror-mime show, so something for everyone," David shares. "The audience arrives at this Haunted House after their car breaks down outside. It's a very classic horror movie trope. A strange caretaker offers them shelter from a storm and then gives them a tour through an ancient mansion where you see the dead, the living and everything in between that occupy the house."
The show mixes theatrical traditions with physical storytelling. "It's meant to be a little bit thrilling and have moments that are slightly scary and sometimes very strange," he explains. "But it's fundamentally comedy driven with gags, character comedy, and things in the tradition of European clown. There are also sections told purely through physicality and mime."
The show has already found audiences at major venues. "Audiences loved it at the Edinburgh Fringe. I recently performed it at Soho Theatre in London and it was received really well," he adds, referring to the place where the Fringe festival was originated.
While the show will remain largely the same for India, a few tweaks are inevitable. "It's going to be pretty similar to what it is in the UK," David says. "There's a reference to a theme park in the UK that people outside the UK might not know, so I'll change a couple of things. But I'm kind of resting on good faith and a little cultural exchange."
Meanwhile, Nigel Miles-Thomas brings a more reflective theatrical experience rooted in the classic world of Sherlock Holmes. His show begins at a poignant moment in the detective's life.
"We find Sherlock Holmes more or less at the end of his life when he goes to the funeral of his great friend Dr Watson," Nigel says. "He's in retirement and doesn't live in Baker Street anymore, but after the funeral he returns to the famous 221B Baker Street. That opens a whole chapter of memory."
The performance revisits the detective's past cases and characters. "All the cases they solved together, all the characters they met in their life together - which can be amusing and also very sad," he explains. "I play Sherlock Holmes predominantly, but I also create quite a lot of the characters involved in these Arthur Conan Doyle stories."
While many adaptations of Holmes exist, Nigel's version leans towards tradition. "The writer and director wanted to root this firmly in the traditional Arthur Conan Doyle style," he says. "Sherlock Holmes has an enormous worldwide audience. People love new interpretations, but they also feel very safe when they're in the hands of traditional Sherlock Holmes."
For both performers, fringe festivals offer a unique space for experimentation and discovery. "Fringe festivals are incredibly useful for performers and great for audiences as well," David says. "Edinburgh Fringe still wears the crown as the biggest international arts festival, but it's not the be-all and end-all anymore."
He notes that smaller festivals around the world are gaining importance.
"There are festivals outside the UK where the reputation is really building. Prague Fringe is a great example. Adelaide Fringe, Perth Fringe - audiences are starting to take notice."
He believes Mumbai's festival shows similar promise.
"Mumbai Fringe is an example of this. It's already demonstrating it has the right attitude," he says.
Nigel agrees that performing at fringe festivals demands flexibility. "You have to be very flexible," he says. "You don't get much preparation time because venues have shows every hour. Sometimes you only get 15 minutes to get ready." The pace can be intense, but performers thrive on it.
"It's fast moving and a little dangerous," he says with a laugh. "But I think most performers kind of like that."
The Mumbai Fringe Festival will make its India debut from March 10 to March 15, opening at the iconic Tata Theatre in NCPA before unfolding across Bandra's creative circuit including Khar Comedy Club, 3 Art House and indifferent Gharonda. Over six days and nearly 60 performances, the festival will transform the neighbourhood into a dynamic cultural map where audiences move between venues, discover new voices and experience comedy, theatre, poetry, storytelling and experimental work in its most immediate form.
The festival will feature artists such as Rohan Joshi, Kanan Gill, Varun Grover, Aakash Gupta, Priya Malik, Amandeep Khayal, Urooj Ashfaq and Amit Tandon, alongside acclaimed global works including Nigel Miles Thomas's award-winning solo performance Sherlock Holmes: The Last Act, a striking solo adaptation of Macbeth presented by UK-based theatre company The Shakespeare Edit, and David Hoskin's Haunted House, a genre-blending mix of mime, comedy and storytelling. True to the Fringe ethos, the programme is intimate, inventive and unafraid to take creative risks.
