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Fringe 2009 Reviews (48)
Paul Merton's Impro Chums
Pleasance Courtyard
*****
TV star Paul Merton returns with one of the Fringe's guaranteed sell-out
shows – it has already added an extra performance – based
on the types of comedy improvisation games made famous on TV by Whose
Line Is It Anyway? and on stage by The Comedy Story Players.
The current line-up consists of Merton himself, of course, Lee Simpson,
Suki Webster, Dr Richard Vranch – who also occasionally fills in
on improvised keyboard – and Mike McShane. Merton warms up the
audience and tells them what to expect and what is expected of them
before opening with a game in which the audience can shout "die"
if a performer makes a mistake.
All of the other games use some suggestions from the audience to challenge
the performers into creating something new, from simple objects and
locations to a very complex occupation for one of the performers to
guess while the others give them bizarre, punning clues in a scene.
They also create scenes based on suggestions written on slips of paper
by the audience as they entered.
There are many groups that will claim to present improvised comedy,
but Merton's chums are some of the most seasoned performers in this
field and know just how to work the games, the suggestions and the audience
for maximum effect. The result is an hour of pure hilarity that passes
far too quickly and is over far too soon.
David Chadderton
Lola: The Life of Lola Montez
Trestle Theatre Company
New Town Theatre
**
St Albans-based Trestle Theatre Company has left its mask theatre roots
behind but is still in the realm of physical performance with this flamenco-inspired
treatment of the life of nineteenth-century Spanish dancer Lola Montez,
who was actually Irish and not really a dancer.
The play is framed as a lecture by Lola about her life, telling us
about her early marriage, her entry into show business, her affair with
King Ludwig I of Bavaria and her possible implication in his fall from
popularity, her affair with the composer Franz Liszt, her performing
tour of Australia, her marriage to a journalist in the US and her declining
health and death at the age of 39 years.
The show features some very energetic Spanish and Irish dancing, especially
from Frederic Gómez, billed as Lolita, but also from Georgina
Roberts in the title role and Fiona Putnam who plays many different
characters throughout the show, and some impressive guitar-work providing
a superb constant soundtrack from Ricardo Garcia.
No one is credited as scriptwriter (Esther Richardson is given the
title of 'dramaturg') which perhaps explains why this whirlwind of fast-paced
action, dance, costume changes, narration and music – all of which
is very well performed – adds up to a confusing muddle rather than
the compelling story that the material could be shaped into. There are
moments of humour and some parts that are quite moving, but for most
of the time it is really difficult to work out what is happening or
how it relates to everything else.
The end product is certainly impressive in terms of the skills on display
but rather incoherent as a show.
David Chadderton
King Ubu
By Alfred Jarry, adapted by Luke Davies
UCLU Runaground
The Zoo
****
A student company may in fact be best placed to give life to this classic
of profane rebellion. There is a Brechtian alienation effect which they
emphasise through a grotesque masked chorus, some deliberately graceless
dancing, and a general crazy vaudeville energy to the whole performance.
But there's more than that to Alfred Jarry's absurdist agenda. This
is, in a way, a parable about civilised people's relationship to the
arts. It is the gloriously stupid and illogical story of Ubu, a snivelling
and ambitious citizen, who plots with his wife to employ a warrior to
murder the king so that he can take his place. The warrior does so (an
impudent murder in front of the entire court at dinner), Ubu takes the
throne and ungratefully casts the warrior out. Within three minutes
he has taxed the nation to ruin to fund his appetite for the lavishly
ridiculous (solid gold crown suspiciously phallic in shape etcetera).
Meanwhile various conspirings between the exiled warrior, the murdered
king's vengeful son, and the neighbouring King of Russia, ensure Ubu's
downfall. Plus there's a talking horse. For whom Ubu abandons his wife.
All peripheral characters, horse included, are played by young mostly
blonde actresses dressed in pretty white, with only a token distinguishing
crown or waistcoat thrown on. The anarchy, the vulgarity, the blink-and-miss-it
plot twists are all very much the point. Evan Milton and Hannah Berry
as Pere and Mere Ubu are both excellent: bent-backed, snivelling cretins,
Milton spouting the odd bit of philosophy but mostly shouting "Shitter!"
whenever displeased. (The action's even interrupted for a bit of Freudian
analysis about this - he's anally-centric apparently.) The two also
double as upright, po-faced newsreader types who narrate the action
with RP accents. It's all done with real verve, and, while admittedly
perhaps best suited to those who know the play's history, it's provocative
and hilarious enough that it should be inflicted on everyone.
Corinne Salisbury
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