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Fringe 2006 Reviews (16)
¡El Conquistador!
By Thaddeus Phillips with Tatiana Mallarino and Victor Mallarino
Traverse 2
***
It is always good to find something utterly different in Edinburgh
and ¡El Conquistador! is a long way from the traditional
well-made play.
Its solo stage performer, Thaddeus Phillips as Polonio, is an ordinary
countryman in Colombia who decides to travel to Bogota with his best
friend, a pot plant. His plan is to make a fortune by becoming the star
of one of his beloved telenovelas. As he explains, these are Latin American
soap operas, popular around the globe with the notable exceptions of
the UK and USA.
Once he hits the city, this innocent finds a job as a doorman at a
swanky skyscraper. This throws him into a society that mirrors the one
that he watches on TV every day. There are romance and glamour, drink
and drugs and even a murder.
The story shows this latter-day Columbus becoming a crutch on whom
the residents rely and also an unlikely figure of lust for no fewer
than three women simultaneously.
Where ¡El Conquistador! is at its finest is in the mix
of live acting and film. Polonio regularly disappears from his booth
and apparently walks straight into the screen. He also makes great and
excessively meticulous use of some adaptable props designed around a
single rectangular frame.
All of this is pretty effective up to a point but at 100 minutes, what
had originally seemed highly inventive outstays its welcome by half
an hour or so. This is a pity since, with greater focus, the piece would
have been infinitely stronger.
Philip Fisher
Improbable Frequency
Book and Lyrics by Arthur Riordan, music by Bell Helicopter
Traverse 1
****
Top Irish company Rough Magic have become regulars at the Traverse
over the last few years, generally with contemporary slice of life dramas.
The 2006 offering, Improbable Frequency, immediately brings to
mind the romantic, burlesque style of another Irish company, The Corn
Exchange last year in Dublin by Lamplight.
This is a musical spy spoof set in Dublin during the Second World War,
featuring both fictional characters and a number of well-known names,
rarely seen in a flattering light.
Tristram Faraday's skills as a crossword solver attract the interest
of British spymasters. Soon, this upper class twit played with great
wit by Peter Hanly, is posted to Dublin to investigate a plot whereby
the weather follows songs played on a radio show hosted by the eccentric
Meehawl O'Dromedary (Louis Lovett).
The plot moves through cross and double cross, romance and madness,
not to mention the Improbable Frequency of the title. Inevitably, there
is a happy ending as Faraday solves his clues, saves the world and then
chucks up his career for the love of sweet Philomena (Lisa Lambe).
The enjoyment is enhanced by the appearances of the big names. John
Betjeman, complete with Teddy Bea,r is unbearably camp for a spy who
should ideally have a stiff upper lip. The excellent Darragh Kelly's
Flann O'Brien is constantly drunk, mirroring the journalist's true sad
history and Erwin Schrödinger, making a guest appearance without
his cat but operating a flashing Heath Robinson invention by way of
compensation, is completely mad.
Under Artistic Director Lynne Parker, Improbable Frequency is
great burlesque fun with consistently excellent timing. This enhances
the impact of many hilarious comic lines, usually in verse and often
accompanied by a variety of musical styles, generally with some kind
of jazz influence, though reaching a peak with an Irish/Nazi version
of The Irish Rover.
Philip Fisher
Meeting Joe Strummer
By Paul Hodson
Gilded Balloon Teviot
**
Presided over by the iconic Julian Yewdall photo of their hero and
accompanied by a Clash sountrack, two men idolise (or is that fetishise?)
Joe Strummer.
We see Nick and Steve (Nick Miles and Steve North) progressing from
teenagers to their forties but never losing their blind devotion to
a man whom they see as more like a God than a pop star.
Nick is right on politically and claims to know Joe as a close friend.
As a teen, he is the mature one but as the years pass by and the two
men live according to The Thoughts of Chairman Joe, it is Steve who
becomes a more rounded human being with a wife and family. However,
he is the one who still goes to the gigs even long after The Clash have
given way to the Mescaleros as Strummer's band.
Nick can't stick marriage but is an Eastenders star and retains
his political values throughout the Thatcher years, only selling out
when work makes this necessary.
The problem with these two men is that they are totally unexceptional
and therefore, while the music is great and Strummer fiends will cackle
in embarrassed recognition, their personal journeys do not really justify
a 75-minute play.
Philip Fisher
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