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Fringe 2009 Reviews (92)
The Doubtful Guest
Inspired by the book by Edward Gorey, written by Shôn Dale-Jones
Hoipolloi Theatre
Traverse Theatre
**
Hoipolloi has based its latest show on Edward Gorey's rhyming, illustrated
story about a strange creature that moves in with a family uninvited
and their attempts to get rid of it in various ways including by just
ignoring it.
On entering the larger Traverse 1, the audience is greeted by a stage
filled with various objects or bits of furniture either on the stage
floor or hanging from it at various heights. A cast of odd-looking and
hesitant characters wanders the stage and auditorium preparing to start
telling the audience its terrible tale. Their story has a few false
starts as they keep being interrupted by crashes from offstage, but
they they explain in great detail what they are going to do and the
nature of theatre before their very physical re-enactment.
There are many elements of this production that have been used before
by companies such as Kneehigh, but this production does not display
the wit, inventiveness or imagination of the Cornwall-based group. The
solution to stretching out a very short story to make a 90-minute theatre
piece seems to be to do it very slowly with lots of repetition –
far past the point of being funny to a level usually only found in pre-school
TV programmes – and over-explanation of what they are doing, which
quickly becomes tedious.
It is performed with complete commitment and great skill by the five
performers: Cassie Friend, Ben Frimston, Stefanie Müller, Andrew
Pembrooke and Trond-Erik Vassdal, raising it above the level of a poor
student parody Fringe show that deceives itself that it is being very
funny and original.
There is an interesting idea for the ending that uses the whole theatre
to try to create a frightening atmosphere, but after an hour and a half
of tediousness it is too little too late and is barely enough to wake
up the audience in time for them to leave.
David Chadderton
Campfire Stories
By Rich Hall
Assembly @ George Street
****
Popular grumpy American comedian Rich Hall returns as always to Edinburgh
with his stand-up show, but he also has this interesting little comedy
at the Assembly Rooms, which he stars in with fellow American comedians
Mike Wilmot and Tim Williams.
Rich is a keen fisherman who ties his own flies, which he makes from
a wide and odd variety of materials and is very proud of, who has found
the perfect trout fishing spot and created the perfect mayfly to fish
with. Mike isn't exactly 'one with nature' and cannot see the appeal
of the countryside or of fishing but is camping with a girl he met over
the Internet who isn't entirely human. Tim ties flies for a living for
his fishing shop and has a hatred of gadgetry and the modern world and
a great attachment to bizarre conspiracy theories.
This is a charming and very funny piece of theatre. The three comedians
have a superb rapport with one another and even interact freely occasionally
with the audience and improvise within scenes in quite a competitive
way, trying to make one another laugh or pointing out when the other
doesn't know where he is going with his current thread. This fits in
fine with the style of the piece and is part of its charm and its fun.
Tickets seem to be in short supply for this small room now that Hall's
dour face is seen quite regularly on television, but this is a show
that it is well worth making the effort to fit in.
David Chadderton
In a Thousand Pieces
By The Paper Birds
Pleasance Courtyard
****
A performance that starts out with an air of fresh innocence transforms
itself into a hard-hitting attack on every Briton who turns a blind
eye to society's ills.
Three women plus a musician/sound engineer use a combination of verbatim
and physical theatre to explore the seamy world of sex slavery.
Dressed identically, the young women arrive happily from somewhere
in Eastern Europe excited about the Brave New World of opportunity that
the UK offers them.
In no time though, they are kidnapped or enticed into earning money
by servicing up to ten men a day, earning a pittance for themselves
but big money for their masters.
This ensemble won a Fringe First for the show last year and its mix
of reportage and movement to convey the agony that young women go through
after they are effectively enslaved in a supposedly free country is
the kind of theatre that can change lives. Strongly recommended for
all - but especially any passing politicians.
Philip Fisher
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