Kylie Jenner’s Private Jet is Pelican Theatre’s first full-length production. Contrasting Kylie Jenner and other rich people’s blind extravagance and disregard of the climate emergency and our feelings of guilt, powerlessness, frustration and even dread, the performance takes us on a journey, literally and metaphorically, using text, dance and humour.
The first thing I notice is the buzz in the auditorium, then comes a short, charming piece performed by Pelican Theatre’s Creative Community Movement Group. Once seated in the auditorium, the show opens with a fine work, created for Dance City’s Centre for Advanced Training (CAT) students.
Kylie Jenner’s Private Jet is ambitious and absurdist; the immense work put in by this young Newcastle-based duo, Pagan Hunt and Ellie Trow, is palpable, and at 50 minutes, it is the right length. It opens with two pert and bland air hostesses, Pagan and Ellie, who talk us through typical onboard flight procedures. These hostesses are a recurring motif. What follows are different scenes and scenarios from the comedic and madcap, floor-based Can-Can to the poetic, a sheet of plastic, all this drawing us closer and closer to inevitable calamity.
The text is funny, although peppered with facts, sometimes poignant and uncomfortable. There’s some strong movement seen in, among other sections, a diagonally travelling ‘push / pull’ duet, quite desperate in quality. Fine dramaturgy by Andy Gardiner, varied music by Mark Johnson and inventive lighting by Charly Dunford really enhance the show.
A timely and lively show, the pressure Pelican Theatre were probably under to also create the other works may have impacted on some detail and further exploration into the dark humour and realities of climate collapse. Hopefully they’ll get that time!
Commissioned and made possible by Gillian Dickinson Trust, Dance City, Northumberland Dance Development.
On tour at Sunderland College Tuesday 6 May, Queens Hall, Hexham Wednesday 21 May Alnwick Playhouse, Saturday 24 May and Gosforth Civic Theatre, Monday 26 May.