'I must do Edinburgh now'

IT'S about 90F (32C) in the shade, and there isn't any on the stage of Fringe Factory Theatre in Adelaide. The spotlights are blazing into my eyes as I try to explain the intricacies of The Scotsman's Fringe First awards to an audience I can barely see. They're there, though. I can taste their excitement.

Adelaide is home to the second largest Fringe in the world – after Edinburgh's – and the biggest in the Southern hemisphere. Yet the people I meet here fall into two basic categories: those who have been to the Edinburgh Fringe and those who very clearly want to go there.

The ones most serious about making the trip to the other side of the world in August are here at the Edinburgh Fringe Roadshow, one of a series of events staged by the Fringe around the world at which a panel of seasoned Edinburgh veterans promote the festival and offer advice to the eager.

It's a question of mixing inspiration and caution, according to Eileen O'Reilly, promoter liaison manager at the Edinburgh Fringe. "We're reaching out to potential performers," she says. "We're not just assuming that people will keep coming, and that Edinburgh will always be the biggest. Also, we know people are coming who aren't really prepared, so we want to give them a clear idea of what they can expect."

It quickly becomes apparent that the promotion part isn't necessary. You don't need to sell Edinburgh to this crowd. They know it's the place they need to go in the world to get their work seen. They just need to know how to get there.

"I just so want to get my music out there," says Adam Page, who is a multi-instrumentalist (the list includes sax, flute, beat box, tuvan throat-singing, a power drill and a carrot).

He has won awards at Adelaide and in Melbourne for his show, Adam Page Solo. Edinburgh is the natural next step, albeit rather a big one.

He's applied to the Pleasance and the Underbelly, which has offered him a slot at 11pm. "What do you think? Is that too late? Have you heard of the Roxy?" Page knows a thing or two about publicity – I leave with a copy of his CD to fit into my bulging luggage.

The same eagerness is written all over the face of comedy-sketch company Hound of the Baskervilles, from Melbourne, who hope to bring their show, Every Film Ever Made, a kind of Reduced-Shakespeare take on movie history, to Edinburgh.

"I want to go for the same reason I came to Adelaide a few years ago," says Adam McKenzie. "All my friends went and said they'd had the best time ever. Then I went with a show and had the best time in the world. And August in Melbourne is boring."

Claire Glenn of Three To A Room, who made last year's Fringe hit A Hot Air Balloon Across Antarctica, also on the panel, explains the necessity of flyering and offering discounted or even free tickets for early performances to let word-of-mouth do its work.

Producer Richard Jordan has a cautionary tale about publicity stunts. In 2003, "comedy terrorist" Aaron Barschak staged one of the biggest Fringe publicity stunts of all time when he gatecrashed Prince William's 21st birthday party dressed as Osama Bin Laden. Sure enough, he ensured that his opening night audience was packed with journalists – but they slated his show and it vanished without trace.

Eileen O'Reilly does her best to explain how little money most companies make on the Fringe – even successful ones – and how shows are programmed back-to-back so you can expect to have no more than minutes to set up and take down your set. I talk about the difficulty of getting your production reviewed.

But, however practical we are, we can't dampen their enthusiasm. Nor can we really convey the madness of it all: what it's like to flyer the Royal Mile; or play your heart out to an audience of three; or to share a flat with 15 people (Three To A Room were formed in Edinburgh, their name inspired by their living arrangements).

Comic Daniel Moore is weighing his options. Will he lose money? Probably. Will it be worth it? Possibly. It's a risk, but if he's to make his name outside Australia this is a step he has to take.

Vanessa B Baylen has already made up her mind. The creator and director of Death By Chocolate, "an interactive murder mystery with chocolate tasting", has sold out at Melbourne and Adelaide. "I must do Edinburgh now," she says, determinedly. She is looking for a local chocolatier to work with, while Fawlty Towers – The Dining Experience is looking for a restaurant prepared to host the antics of Basil, Sybil and co.

Once the frenzy has died down, producer Paul Lucas muses over what it is that makes Edinburgh the place everyone wants to come to. "There is no other festival on earth that people fly thousands of miles to just to be in the audience. Look at how many shows come into New York or London from the Edinburgh Fringe. It really is the place to see new work, and to network with other performers and other producers. I've enjoyed Adelaide, but it has highlighted for me just how well Edinburgh does what it does."

Sometimes you have to travel to the other side of the world to appreciate what you've got at home.

• The 2008 Edinburgh Fringe programme is launched today

Rough around the edges but with a special laid-back charm

WITHIN a few hours of landing in Adelaide, I'm sitting in a wheelchair, blindfolded, while a big, friendly Belgian ties my hands with a piece of string. Woozy and jet lagged, I'm whirled into the moving, multi-sensory theatrical experience of a show called The Smile Off Your Face.

At least I can take comfort from the fact that the company behind this, Belgium's Ontroerend Goed, have travelled almost as far as I have. Last time I saw them, they were in Edinburgh and we were giving them a Fringe First.

Anyone who has been to the Edinburgh Fringe will get déjà vu in Adelaide. Linda Marlowe is doing Berkoff's Women, Camille is singing Brel, Guy Masterson is flyering, Karen Dunbar is making people laugh.

There is Best of the Fest, La Clique and Silent Disco. The Garden of Unearthly Delights is the spitting image of the Spiegel Garden. Heck, if it wasn't for the weather and the wine (South Australia is a top wine producer and every Fringe venue seems to be sponsored by a winery) I could almost be at home.

But it would be wrong to suggest that the Adelaide programme is packed with second-hand Edinburgh hits. I saw plenty of home-grown theatre and comedy, including Linsey Pollak, who makes music out of bicycle parts, and Lucy Wilson, from Tasmania, whose new play is set in a manhole. Acrobat-entertainers Tom Tom Club, a hit at Edinburgh last year, were discovered here.

When the Adelaide Festival launched in 1960, it was deliberately based on the Edinburgh model: a "main" festival, programming works of international standing (the Adelaide Bank Festival of the Arts), and a big, unruly, open-access Fringe. There is even a literary festival, Writer's Week, under canvas in a city centre park.

While ABFA remains biennial, last year the Fringe became an annual event. "It has definitely defined us as a festival in our own right," says Fringe director Christie Anthoney (who cut her teeth running venues in Edinburgh). "The audience has embraced it beyond our wildest dreams."

Anthoney accepts that Adelaide will always be smaller than Edinburgh (550 shows this year to Edinburgh's more than 2,000) and will always have a different flavour. Because the audience is predominantly local, this is no 24-hour party. The majority of shows happen between 4pm and 10pm. By 11pm, the streets are quiet. Few restaurants serve later than ten.

But Adelaide has a special laid-back charm that isn't just to do with wine and weather. It's remarkably free of branding, and of big comedy promoters pushing the next big thing. You can cross town without filling your pockets with flyers.

The Fringe Factory Theatre, for example, is housed in a semi-derelict pie factory. The paint is peeling and there are two huge ovens that no one has bothered to throw out. People have brought in old sofas and standard lamps and created a bar. It has a grassroots quality hard to find in Edinburgh these days.

Christie Anthoney talks about the value of better signposting, of encouraging entrepreneurs and producer-run venues, learning from Edinburgh's "professionalism" while retaining the rough edges that give the Fringe its appeal.

"It would be an absolute delusion if we thought we could be anywhere near the size and scale of Edinburgh. But we have an opportunity to be a springboard into the Australasian market. I'd like the Adelaide Fringe to become the platform for the new in the Southern Hemisphere." And for those of us who get to September and can't wait till next August, it's good to know there is halfway house in a pleasant city on the other side of the world.