Cabaret of Dangerous Ideas
The Cabaret of Dangerous Ideas is back! Now in its sixth year, CODI is a blend of controversial academic research, audience interaction, and a dash of comedy at the world’s largest arts festival - and you're invited!

The Cabaret of Dangerous Ideas is a unique programme of events which offer the public an opportunity to engage with world-class researchers in an entertaining environment.
There are only a few rules for performers; one of the most important is the ban on PowerPoints and videos. Instead of hiding behind slides and lecturing, performers are expected to promote debate, discussion and discourse with the audience.
Evaluation carried out by the organisers shows that around 88% of audience members learnt something new at the shows they attended and almost 50% (49% to be exact!) said they’d changed their minds on a subject as a result of the discussion.
This year
Building on the success of the first programme, the Cabaret of Dangerous Ideas has become an established presence in the Spoken Word programme of the Edinburgh Fringe over the last few years and continues to grow. 2018 sees the cabaret bring a whopping 38 unique shows to the Edinburgh Fringe.
Be ready for debate, discussion and discourse (and lots of audience questions) in the company of some of the fiercest intellects that the UK has to offer – from Professors and PhD students to top scientists and researchers.
This year, sexualised advertising, compassionate drugs policy and the benefits of the dark net are just a few of the topics brought to the Festival Fringe as part of the Cabaret of Dangerous Ideas. The Cabaret will feature academics from University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh Napier University, Heriot-Watt University and Queen Margaret University as well as researchers from further afield in Scotland and England.
This year’s Cabaret of Dangerous Ideas programme really is exceptional in its breadth of subject area and quality of the academics who will be performing. It’s shaping up to be our best year ever and we anticipate many of the shows will sell out.
Get tickets
The infamous and intruiging Cabaret of Dangerous Ideas takes place twice a day from the 3rd August to the 26th August at 1:30pm and 8:10pm at The Stand’s New Town Theatre.
Tickets vary from £7-£10 and are available on the Outstanding Tickets website https://www.outstandingtickets.com/cabaret-of-dangerous-ideas
For the first time ever all shows will take place in The Stand’s New Town Theatre Studio with two shows a day, every day.
2018 shows
Cabaret of Dangerous Ideas (1.30-2.30pm) |
Cabaret of Dangerous Ideas By Candlelight (8.10-9.10pm)
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03 Abolish Childhood! |
03 What Does Sex Sell? |
04 Privacy Is Dead, Long Live Privacy! 05 Who Do You Want To Wipe Your Bum? |
04 Hey, You At The Back! 05 Silence In The Archive |
06 Dr Google Will See You Now! 07 Doing MORE Drugs (Policy) 08 The Problem With Patriotism 09 Never A Soft Touch 10 Stop Making Sense! 11 Fibre Optics Can Save The World! 12 School Of Batman- Live! 13 Ditch The Classroom; Speak In Tongues! 14 Disgust For Dummies 15 All News Is Fake News 16 What Keeps You Sharp? 17 Footballers Have Feelings Too 18 Politics Of The Tooth Fairy 19 Monolinguals, Where Are You? 20 The Naked Blind Data Show 21 The Dark Side Of Fluorescence 22 Will Pigs Save Our Bacon? 23 Never Say Die? 24 Footballers Have Feelings Too 25 May Contain Neanderthal 26 The Spy Who Doped Me |
06 Listening To The Public Is Dangerous 07 What Keeps You Sharp? 08 Monolinguals, Where Are You? 09 Science Is F***ed 10 We’re All Mental! 11 Why Is Mental Illness So Goddam Controversial? 12 Turn To The Darknet 13 Fibre Optics Can Save The World! 14 Cows Eat Grass, Don’t They? 15 Privacy Is Dead, Long Live Privacy! 16 Ditch The Classroom; Speak In Tongues! 17 Suspect Confessions 18 Science is F***ed 19 No Copyright, No Problem? 20 Is Astronaut Food The Future? 21 Big Boys Don’t Cry 22 Silence In The Archive 23 When Is Lying Good? 24 #YesAllMen? 25 Abolish Childhood! 26 We’re All Mental! |
Find out more
Contact lola.moutel@ed.ac.uk or visit codi.beltanenetwork.org for more information.