Adam Riches: The Captain review – the extraordinary glory of a ‘half man, half fish’ Victorian hero

Summerhall, Edinburgh An endurance test for a standup already starring in a fringe hit, this show resurrects the man who drilled the first ever cross-Channel swimmer ‘Who are these people that do what [the rest of us] cannot?” Adam Riches ’ solo play The Captain teases at the daredevil spirit, incarnate here in Capt Matthew Webb, the first man to swim the Channel unaided. Riches plays Fred Beckwith, a swimming coach who trains the young Webb for his tilt at greatness. The show takes the form of a lecture-cum-eulogy to the “half man, half fish” Webb, whose body lies under a shroud on a table in

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