The winners have been announced for this year’s 2025 Edinburgh Untapped Award, organised by Underbelly, the New Diorama Theatre and Concord Theatricals.
The three winning companies each receive a £10,000 cash grant to support their show in Edinburgh.
The winners are Alpaqa who present JEEZUS!, Nonstop with their show Pigs Fly Easy Ryan, and Emergency Chorus and their show Ways of Knowing.
The winners also get a package of paid-for PR and marketing support, an enhanced venue programming deal from Underbelly at the Edinburgh Fringe, and publication by Concord Theatricals under their UK imprint Samuel French Ltd.
The partnership with Underbelly, New Diorama and Concord Theatricals aims to discover and support early and mid-career theatre makers at the Edinburgh Fringe and this year proves no different as the companies prepare to present game-changing work this August.
Also shortlisted for the 2025 award were: Burger Chef by 60 Miles; I’NA SUIT YOU by Blemme Fatale Productions; Catherine by Boal & Company; Transit by Halfpace Theatre; Down to Chance by Maybe You Like It; Hurts So Good by Milk No Sugar Theatre Company; a nightmare is witchwork by Small Hours; ITCH, SCRATCH, RELIEF by Static Limit; and DOGGY by why this sky.
The Untapped Award has become a major launchpad, nationally recognised for its success in identifying and platforming brilliant new talent, with winners going on to embark on successful tours, show transfers, securing international opportunities and winning awards!
Alpaqa said in a statement: “We’re extremely excited to have our silly & sexy take on ultimate daddy’s boy JEEZUS! come to the Fringe under the Untapped umbrella. Can’t wait for Cowgate audiences to experience this holy queer, anti colonialist fantasia.”
Nonstop said: “Winning the Untapped Award has filled us with hope that we can keep doing what we love, in a way that really feeds us emotionally and artistically. We started making this show because we wanted to make something cathartic, ritualistic, totally ridiculous, and hyper sensorial. We wanted to work without the pressure to consciously know what we were making before we made it. Untapped giving us the green light to work that way has felt like the most unbelievable gift. We’re beyond excited to bring our feral show to Underbelly audiences.”
Emergency Chorus said: “We’re absolutely over the moon to receive the Untapped Award. It’s so wonderful to have meaningful support to share our show with people this summer, and a rare opportunity for small-scale fringe makers like us to really get to know the intricacies of a show over a luxurious month’s run. Our hope is that the award will help us introduce new audiences to our work, open up new professional opportunities for us, and help make a case for the appeal of boldly experimental work in an increasingly risk-averse theatre landscape.”
More about the winners
JEEZUS!
Belly Button, Underbelly Cowgate Edinburgh, 31 July – 24 August (no performances 11 and 18) at 18:50
Alpaqa, a theatre collective led by creatives Sergio Antonio Maggiolo, Guido Garcia Lueches and Laura Killeen, will present JEEZUS!, a bold, irreverent, and euphoric musical comedy that celebrates self-discovery, faith, and queerness through the power of anthemic pop Latin bangers. Set against the backdrop of a South American Catholic upbringing, it follows an altar boy on the path to his first communion – only to experience a queer awakening as he falls head over heels (and balls deep) for Jesus Christ himself. Blending clowning, musical theatre, and magical realism, the show unpacks the suffocating grip of authoritarianism in faith, family, and fatherland while celebrating the absurdity and beauty of belief. Audiences can expect to laugh until their faces hurt, reflect on their own upbringing, and perhaps even find healing in the recognition of their own divinity. Amidst dark times, JEEZUS! dares to imagine a hopeful future – one where queer liberation shines bright.
Pigs Fly Easy Ryan
Iron Belly, Underbelly Cowgate Edinburgh, 31 July – 24 August (no performances 11 and 18) at 20:10
Creative team Nonstop, made up of multidisciplinary artists Lou Doyle, Trevor White and Kendra A Miller, presents Pigs Fly Easy Ryan, a wild, high-flying spectacle for audiences 18 and over. Two plane crash fetishists illegally pose as flight attendants to sneak aboard a plane and live out their ultimate fantasy – total destruction. Hilarious, chaotic, and strangely tender, the show playfully eroticises freedom in a world teetering on the edge of climate collapse and rising fascism. With a mix of physical comedy, visceral intensity, and direct-to-audience sincerity, Pigs Fly Easy Ryan captures the thrill of a spontaneous getaway on a maxed-out credit card with the guilt, escapism, and fleeting euphoria. At its core, it’s an exploration of connection, consumption, safety, sex, and survival, all wrapped in a slightly sticky, heart-filled embrace. Buckle up, it’s going to be a turbulent ride.
Ways of Knowing
Big Belly, Underbelly Cowgate Edinburgh, 31 July – 24 August (no performances 11 and 18) at 15:30
Award-winning performance duo Emergency Chorus, consisting of Clara Potter-Sweet and Ben Kulvichit, presents Ways of Knowing, a mysterious and slippery dance-theatre work that explores the impossibility of predicting the future. Through detailed choreography, live sound design, and found text, Ben and Clara investigate the strange tools humans have relied on to foresee what’s to come – storm-predicting leeches, Victorian inventors, mystical tarot figures, hermits in caves, and corporate trend forecasters. The show unfolds in two distinct halves, moving from deadpan humour and synchronized dance to an apocalyptic soundscape and a chilling descent into uncertainty. As we navigate a world shaped by accelerating technology, corporate power, and the climate crisis, Ways of Knowing challenges our desperation to control the unknown. Instead, it invites us to embrace uncertainty and carve out space for imagining radically better futures – together.
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