A TOP Edinburgh Fringe Festival boss fears last year’s box office disaster could force some shows and venues into “a spectacular financial collapse.”
Tomek Borkowy, a leading festival venue manager for 18 years, has accused Fringe bosses of keeping sponsorship money to themselves and demanded a dramatic reshuffle of the world famous festival’s board.
In an explosive open letter to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe Society, Borkowy announced he is to put on a post-mortem type debate after this year’s Fringe.
He hopes performers, ticket-buyers, businesses and MSPs will discuss “What’s the Fringe Worth,” in a bid to prevent to turn around falling ticket sales.
And he compared Fringe organisers to the bankers blamed for the global recession.
He said: “Circumstances over the past years have given many of us cause for concern – in particular, a lack of leadership in providing guidance to Fringe office staff, a lack of openness and sincerity in dealing with other Fringe Festival stakeholders and total misjudgement of the time frame needed to introduce a new box office system, culminating in last year’s Box Office disaster.
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