Category: ff2015

[2015077] Frank, the Mind-reading Hotdog

[2015077] Frank, the Mind-reading Hotdog

Matt Penny @ Holden Street Theatres – The Studio

6:00pm, Wed 25 Feb 2015

I’m eating sleep-averting Twisties in the bar at Holden Street when a man approaches me: “You’re here to see Frank, the Mind-reading Hotdog?” he queries. I nod afformatively and, noticing the clipboard in his hand, guessed what was coming next. “Draw any picture,” he suggested, “as long as you can recreate it later on.”

So, since I’m a Pisces, I drew this, keeping the image to myself:

A crap attempt at a fish

(I quite like the left-handed wry smile.)

And, with a nod (and without seeing what I’d drawn), the man talks me to keep the piece of paper in my pocket… and walks away.

When the audience settles in The Studio for Frank the Mind-reading Hotdog, numbers are disappointing… depressing, even. There’s six of us in the space, and at least two of those were Holden Street staff; but it doesn’t take much cajoling for us to all sit in the front row, and one of the other ticket holders is bubbly and enthusiastic.

When Frank the Mind-reading Hotdog appears… well, he’s a hotdog. Or a man in a sketchy hotdog suit, anyway. He explains away the suit, tells us a little about himself (a Perth-based mentalist), and a bit about the trickery behind mentalism… and then proceeded to blow our minds.

Sure, I can speculate on how some of his tricks were performed: three six digit numbers, added together, texted to a phone… I can kinda see how that might work. Audience members interacting with three sections of a board which never leaves Frank’s hands… yeah, I’ve kinda got that one, too.

But knowing about my fish? Picking the fact that I wrote “bedroom” on a card (though I’m probably wearing my Significant Other’s impending visit all over my face)? Convincing one girl he touched her left hand, when he only touched her right?

That stuff was amazing.

And through it all, Frank is… just Frank. A sweaty man in a non-breathing hotdog suit. He’s constantly taking the piss out of himself (and the audience), and there’s awful jokes between each trick that keep the show moving along… the mentalism almost feels incidental to his preposterous presence. But it totally works. And the fact that we were so close to him at every stage of proceedings just made his tricks all the more special.

(I talked to Frank after the show and learn that he’d just lost a friend back in Perth, and was cancelling the rest of his run to return there for the funeral. Mad props to him for delivering such a professional show with that weighing on his mind.)

[2015076] Best of Adelaide Fringe: Late Show

[2015076] Best of Adelaide Fringe: Late Show

Rik Carranza [emcee] (with Jack Campbell, Matt Grey, Evan Desmarais, & Nik Coppin) @ Belgian Beer Cafe ‘Oostende’

10:15pm, Tue 24 Feb 2015

After my previous show ran long, I wound up scooting upstairs at the Belgian Beer Cafe just after the emcee for the evening, Rik Carranza, had taken to the stage to try and fire up the assembled crowd. This proved to be a little difficult, not necessarily because of his initial material (mostly based on his Asian heritage), but more due to the layout of the venue: lounge seating wrapped around the sides of the stage, which meant that people who opted for the super-comfy option (rather than the stock seating directly in front of the stage) were very much physically laid back (not a good way to seem attentive), and on the fringes of the performer’s vision. Despite this, Carranza garnered some laughs throughout the evening, though his hosting duties were more perfunctory than exemplary.

First of the main acts was Jack Campbell (2014’s English Comedian of the Year). His spot was pretty good fun, but he looked physically brittle onstage… which was easily explained once he revealed the ripper sunburn that he’d acquired at the beach. Oh, you foolish Englishmen, will you never learn? Our sun is not like your sun.

(…says the guy who once got sunburnt in Edinburgh, Scotland.)

Mute Matt (Matt Grey) was up next, performing a mime set that owed a lot to The Boy With Tape On His Face. It was a really polished spot, let down only by the reluctance of the audience… once again, those lounges that framed the stage must have been super comfy, because no-one wanted to budge from them.

After a bit of a break, Canadian Evan Desmarais tried to gee people up with some political material – which I loved, but the laid-back crowd were a little more circumspect. Any goodwill they gave him, however, flew out the window when he attempted to make terrorism less terror-y… the potential political incorrectness of the material completely killed the mood, though – once again – I thought it was pretty reasonable comedy. It’d be interesting to see Desmarais with a like-minded and interested crowd, rather than a bunch of people lounging back in their seats and checking Facebook.

Finally, Nik Coppin brought his usual easygoing charm to proceedings, and won the crowd back with his lively banter and engagement, this time focussing on his time-tested and true stories about racism.

In a rapidly-expanding field of comedy line-up shows, Best of Adelaide Fringe: Late Show doesn’t really do much to differentiate itself… apart from using an awkward (for the performers) room. Was this really, as the title would claim, the “Best of Adelaide Fringe”? Well, no… but there were some moments worth a solid chortle, and Evan Desmarais and Jack Campbell proved to be names to look out for in the future.

[2015075] FUSION GUITAR: CLASSICAL & PERCUSSIVE GUITAR

[2015075] FUSION GUITAR: CLASSICAL & PERCUSSIVE GUITAR

Declan Zapala @ The Garage International – Town Hall

9:00pm, Tue 24 Feb 2015

So – I’m scanning through the Fringe Guide in early (late?) January, and a phrase leapt off the page at me: “You won’t believe it’s just one man and a guitar.” I’m interested, and read the rest of the précis… and when I saw “classical & percussive guitar”, I immediately thought of the amazing Tim McMillan. But I’ve been hurt by that expectation before, so I was a little wary when heading to the Town Hall.

But I bump into some old neighbours in the queue out front, and we have a nice chat… it’s been ages since I’d seen them, and we swap stories and they’re super-interested in hearing about my new belle, and I’m loving the opportunity to tell them about it since (a) I’m pretty sure they thought I was gay, and (2) she’s coming to Adelaide in three days and to say that I was a little excited was an extreme understatement. Anyway… we chat, the doors open, and the deceptively large Town Hall venue gets about a quarter full of mainly middle-aged people who mostly seem to have some idea who Declan Zapala is.

I, however, have no idea who he is.

It turns out that Zapala is a slight, quiet Englishman who plays guitar well. His fingers are undoubtedly quick, but I must admit to being a little disappointed with his opening two pieces, both Eric Roche covers… the technical skills were certainly there, but there was little engagement on the musical level.

But once Zapala moved onto his own compositions, my interest was stoked: they tended to be more uptempo, intricate pieces that showed off the fast fingering style of guitar that I’d been hoping to see. And this was genuinely compelling stuff… for awhile. But let me be completely honest here: the music was awesome, but – once I got the groove of any of his pieces, and figured out his rhythms and percussion points – I spent much of the performance with my eyes closed, imagining that I was in the arms of my Significant Other. My mind would drift forward another three days… but then the song would end, there’d be some wonderfully English banter with the audience, and the next song would grab me… for awhile.

Fusion Guitar was certainly well-performed, and Declan Zapala’s own songs were compelling listening… and he’s a lovely bloke, too, with his amiable chatter and insistence on meeting people at the end of the show. But rather than songs being a fusion of nimble picking and percussion, as I’d hoped, alternate songs tended to focus on one of the two styles… and that left me longing for McMillan’s batshit-insane approach to melding the two approaches in the one song.

[2015074] Too Much Light Makes The Baby Go Blind: 30 Plays in 60 Minutes

[2015074] Too Much Light Makes The Baby Go Blind: 30 Plays in 60 Minutes

The Neo-Futurists @ Garden of Unearthly Delights – Le Cascadeur

6:55pm, Tue 24 Feb 2015

I love performances that are composed of lots of little vignettes; the amazing (and always different) 52 Pick Up is my favourite such show. But whilst that show has a fixed script, delivered in a random order, Too Much Light Makes The Baby Go Blind ups the ante a little: a random order, sure, but the thirty plays themselves are sourced from a much bigger pool… and many are freshly written.

Upon entry, the packed house was given a programme containing details of the performers, et al… but also, more importantly, the list of all the plays for the evening (or, rather, the “Menu for 24 & 25 February, 2015”). The numbers one to twenty-nine hung on sheets of paper over the stage, ready to be torn down when performed; the thirtieth play, we were informed, would only be performed if there was enough time. And then, with much of the audience yelling out their favourite numbers as a direction for the next play, they were off.

The cast of five hurtled through the plays, but with titles like “Variations on how it could go”, as short as “dervish”, or as ridiculously long as “If you and I met tonight and this hug sealed our fate even if just for a moment and we would be together in something so real you and I and all of our friends growing, changing, and evolving into something more, something that we cannot grasp just yet but it is there it is here and it is so CLOSE SO CLOSE JUST STOP AND FEEL IT FOR A MOMENT”, there’s no real idea what to expect. They are simply vignettes, well performed (usually for laughs), and sometimes with audience interaction: the long title above required audience members to hug the cast. I was anxious to not waste time – I wanted to see play thirty! – so as soon as I realised what was required, I leapt out of my seat to hug the performer… only to realise that he was way taller than me, and the hug was a little… awkward. In addition, “This or That” was a cracking little piece of wordplay, and “The Grapes of Wrath” was also a winner.

In the end, we ran out of time: our audience didn’t get to see the thirtieth play. And I was a little bit miffed about that… but still left with an overwhelmingly positive feeling in my heart for Too Much Light Makes The Baby Go Blind. Some solid writing is more-than-backed-up by some incredibly enthusiastic performers, leading to a uniquely entertaining experience.

(Side note: as the crowd was squeezing into Le Cascadeur, my Korean acquaintance from the previous week tapped me on the shoulder and gave me a copy Hi Seoul Festival programme… which looked magnificent. Thanks!)

[2015073] My Life in Boxes

[2015073] My Life in Boxes

Gravity Dolls @ Gluttony – The Lotus Palace

5:20pm, Tue 24 Feb 2015

Cross-artform performances are hardly new; even attempts to merge theatre and circus have been seen before. Where My Life in Boxes could have reeled me in was in the content of the narrative: one of the characters was a hoarder seeking change. I was hoping to find familiarity in that.

Performed in front of a wall of cardboard boxes, a simple relationship between the characters – a café owner, Elise, and a doctor at the nearby hospital, Teddy – develops. The contents of some of the boxes are used to trigger events in the narrative – in their relationship – and one suspects that the idea was to generate a sense of discovery.

It’s clear that a lot of thought has been put into the set, but the manner in which the performers (Tim Rutty & Tarah Carey) interact with it is almost superfluous to both the narrative and the tricks. In fact, more effort seemed to have been given to the viewer‘s interaction with the set than the actors, as audience participation includes minor prep work (that could easily have been avoided).

The acrobatic side of the performance, too, felt unnecessary, and even in stark contrast to the accompanying narrative: tricks often seemed to have energy levels mismatched with the scenes that bookended them. If they were supposed to symbolically add to the narrative, it was lost on me.

I think I can see what Gravity Dolls were aiming for with My Life in Boxes, but it didn’t really work for me. The narrative was too thin and – despite a few poignant moments – bordered on the twee. The physical side of the performance was too basic to engage, and there were a few stumbles with tricks on the night. In the end, I’m not even sure whether the whole measured up to the sum of its parts.

[2015072] Lisa-Skye’s Lovely Tea Party

[2015072] Lisa-Skye’s Lovely Tea Party

Lisa-Skye (with Becky Lou & Nicole Henriksen) @ Tuxedo Cat – Rivers Studio

9:45pm, Mon 23 Feb 2015

I’d previously encountered Lisa-Skye in a couple of guest spots previously, but had never actually given her money for any of her shows; I felt obliged to change that this year, and so I – and maybe a dozen other people – sat in on her tea-party this Monday night.

Lisa-Skye uses the performance as an opportunity to record her podcast, but she front-loads the show with a bit of her comedy: on this occasion, she talked about a weird encounter in her favourite Berlin sex club. She also introduces her board of topics from which her guests would select conversation starters – “Animalia” and “Snack-off” were amongst the selections this evening, and each was introduced with its own jingle.

I was stoked with her guests this evening: Nicole Henriksen brought a slightly tempered version of her insanity to proceedings, and Becky Lou (previously seen at IT’S RABBIT NIGHT!!!) provided a relatively restrained contrast to the madness of Lisa-Skye and Nicole.

The conversation between the trio was wide ranging: phobias, the skin care benefits of semen, coat of arms, and Fringe survival tactics. Lisa-Skye and Henriksen also discussed – with scary statistics and much cattiness – the “joys” of performing at the Edinburgh Fringe, and Becky Lou’s nipple health details were… ummmmm. Yes. But, on the strength of her presence during the Tea Party, I committed to seeing Becky Lou’s show later in the Fringe… so that was a win.

Lisa-Skye is a pretty strong personality and keeps the show moving along, but she also has a tendency to dominate conversations somewhat (though she also manages to pull the guests back in after a quiet spell). And hey – the “guest” portions of the show are available on Lisa-Skye’s podcast, so that’s nice too.

[2015071] I Still Call Australia Homo

[2015071] I Still Call Australia Homo

In & Out @ Tuxedo Cat – Perske Pavilion

8:30pm, Mon 23 Feb 2015

Inspired by real-life accounts of homosexual discrimination from all around the world, I Still Call Australia Homo creates a dystopian Australia, where homosexuality has been outlawed & gay-bashing is commonplace. But this dystopia is placed in an eerily idyllic setting: two clean neighbouring houses, manicured gardens, The Great Australian Dream. Two perfect colour-coded couples, Orangey-Red and Aqua-Green.

The Red couple are new to the neighbourhood, and the Greens welcome them with open arms – dinner parties, BBQs, tea and yoga for the women, beer and house maintenance for the men. Early on, there’s a lot of friendly banter and innuendo being flung around… but there’s also openly homophobic remarks, and references to the persecution of homosexuals. The two men eventually develop a relationship, which tears both couples apart… and then the accusations fly thick and fast: just why did the Reds move here, anyway?

For the most part, I Still Call Australia Homo is a relatively conventional production, with a sincere message that is sugar-coated with plenty of humour. Innuendo litters the first half of the show, and the Green Woman stands as a comedic contrast to the rest of the characters. But there’s some really great bits of direction in there, too: the scenes where the characters investigate different dialogue choices triggered by hammering and perfectly synchronised turns of the head are superb.

It’s only long after the show is over that I recognised – and mused upon – one of the more biting aspects of the script: Red Woman is shocked early on by the homophobic jokes of Green Woman, and Green subsequently assumes that Red is a lesbian, though that’s never confirmed by the script. That layer of guilty-by-association is pretty nasty, and perhaps the most sneakily insidious part of this world. And whilst I wasn’t completely sold on I Still Call Australia Homo at the time, it’s nice that it gave me something to think about after-the-fact.

[2015070] Destroyer of Worlds

[2015070] Destroyer of Worlds

Rock Surfers Theatre Company @ Tuxedo Cat – Cusack Theatre

7:15pm, Mon 23 Feb 2015

Caleb Lewis is responsible for one of my favourite bits of Fringe Theatre ever, and this semi-autobiographical piece doesn’t paint him in a good light at all. Destroyer of Worlds wraps the build up – and, more importantly, the breakdown – of Caleb’s relationship with Lauren, and juxtaposes it with the relationship between Little Boy and Hiroshima, which is intertwined with parallels between Haruo Nakajima (the actor in the original Godzilla suit) and J. Robert Oppenheimer (one of the fathers of the atomic bomb).

And, in case that wasn’t enough, Caleb Lewis himself sits among the audience, occasionally stopping the actors – Rebecca Mayo and Phil Spencer – mid-sentence, as he tries to deal with his dissatisfaction of their rendition of his life, and comes to terms with his own issues. Lewis’ harassment of the cast members is brilliantly done, and the best excuse I’ve seen in years to break the fourth wall… the manner in which he alternately attacks and cajoles Mayo to try and get her to evoke the spirit of Lauren is something special.

All the above may seem like a mishmash of incongruent ideas, but it’s actually some of the cleanest, clearest writing I’ve seen in a Fringe theatre piece for years. But it’s accented and clarified by clever use of projections, video overlays (including Lewis’ Mum passing judgement around his relationship with Lauren), and just brilliant direction.

Look – I was likely to love this show from the outset… hey, it’s Caleb Lewis, and Death in Bowengabbie is a major work for me. But the fact that I loved this performance so much, despite sitting there feeling absolutely terrified that I may experience a relationship breakdown like this someday? That must mean that Destroyer of Worlds is something very special.

[2015069] POP POP

[2015069] POP POP

Penny Greenhalgh @ Tuxedo Cat – Rivers Studio

6:00pm, Mon 23 Feb 2015

The photo for POP POP in the Fringe Guide is, frankly, hideous… and the kind of thing that screams confidence. And that, alone, is enough to get me to see a show.

Penny Greenhalgh creates curiosity with her first impressions: creeping in from the rear of the room, she whispered desired “responses” into the ears of the audience, creating an odd – and very slow-moving – ripple of appreciation. There’s a (contradictory) surety to her initial onstage bumblings, and a conviction behind the statement that POP POP was written as an arena spectacular, but subsequently scaled back to a small room experience.

Greenhalgh’s “ice dancing” demonstration (with rollerblades) is a gangly and uncoordinated hoot, and undoubtedly dangerous to both herself and her audience; her attempt at crowd-surfing with an audience that barely hit double-digits likewise risky. And, as is rapidly becoming the norm, I was dragged up onstage to help perform a radio-play version of her soon-to-be breakout hit, “51 Shades of Grey”… the script was hilariously terrible, and required me to make a ton of animal noise sound effects. At least I got to kiss Penny at the end of the piece (leading to a panicky phone call immediately following the show to my Significant Other).

Another Gaulier graduate, Penny Greenhalgh garners a lot of laughs from putting herself into awkward – and dangerous – situations, and then just stewing there awhile. It’s an intriguing presentation from an amazingly confident performer; I’ll certainly be in line to see what she does next.

[2015068] Tripped

[2015068] Tripped

Attic Erratic @ Tuxedo Cat – Cusack Theatre

9:45pm, Sun 22 Feb 2015

Two soldiers walking through a battlefield in another land, regrouping after a helicopter crash… until Norm feels the switch of a landline beneath his feet. Mike leaves Norm for help – not necessarily an easy thing to find in battle. In his absence, a foreign soldier points his rifle at Norm in glee… until he, too, feels the click of a landmine as he approaches.

So begins Tripped, in what should have been a taut and charged look at racial prejudices as – in the face of death – Ahmed and Norm talk… not as enemies, but as unlikely brothers-in-arms. They compare their backgrounds: both have lived in Australia, both have families, both are physically wilting in the desert with rapidly depleting water reserves, and both are a footstep away from a mutual death. With so much in common, how could they be on different sides?

The idea – I’m guessing – is that Norm’s persistent racial prejudices (he’s constantly calling civilians “rag heads”) would appear to be such an unsustainable contrast that we – the audience – would nod sagely and think “yep, those there ingrained notions are bad.” But Norm is so blinkered, and so one-sided, that the script is stretched right out, and becomes too overt in its message. I found Norm to be so unlikeable that I started thinking that the loss of Ahmed’s (relatively) innocent life would be a small price to pay to rid the world of Norm.

And I can totally see why people may rave about Tripped: the performances are great (Ezel Doruk holds Ahmed together really well), and there’s some nice little touches in the direction. But I found it laborious and overt in the extreme… if I’d had my way, the story would’ve ended a lot quicker.

[2015067] Zoe Coombs Marr is DAVE

[2015067] Zoe Coombs Marr is DAVE

Zoe Coombs Marr @ Tuxedo Cat – Rivers Studio

8:30pm, Sun 22 Feb 2015

Dave would have to be one of the most rank, feral, sleazy shitbag characters to ever grace a stage, I reckon. An aspiring comic, he’s anxious for his stage time to reflect all that is great about the World of Dave… and that makes for a deeply unsettling hour.

Oh – and it’s funny. Dave is funny. We laugh at him – at his poor humour, poor judgement, poor presentation, poor choices… and the yawning chasm of desperation that he inadvertently shows. He’s a hateful, yet utterly sympathetic character.

But it only works because Dave is played by a woman.

Zoe Coombs Marr has created a character that, because of her portrayal of him, is able to get away with some of the most politically incorrect stuff that I’ve heard onstage this year – christ, it still feels bad to have laughed at that rape joke. But because Dave is supposed to be an every-man – or an every-comic – she’s able to put a lot of home-truths into his act, and – in turn – make her act potently political.

And funny. Did I mention that Dave is funny?

With his filthy thin ponytail, sweaty neckbeard, a backhanded admonishment for women, and an overly desperate need for companionship (Dave was constantly trying to find out where I lived so he could come over and hang out), it’s impossible to like Dave on any level. With his terribly immature rant about the hidden clitoris, it’s impossible not to pity him. When he seems like he’s walking down a path to discovering that he’s gay, it’s impossible not to piss yourself laughing at Zoe’s performance, with Dave’s mental contortions evident on his slimy face. And when Dave falls onstage, and stands back up with a trickle of blood running down his face… well, I felt equal parts happy and sad.

In the months since I encountered Dave‘s efforts at comedy, I’ve had opportunities to really mull over its qualities… and I reckon that I’d rave more about it now than I did back then. It’s an astonishingly astute, repulsive, and loveable character that Zoe Coombs Marr has developed; the emotional dissonance I felt in that hour was quite unlike anything else I’ve experienced.

[2015066] Aunty Donna

[2015066] Aunty Donna

Aunty Donna @ Tuxedo Cat – Perske Pavilion

7:15pm, Sun 22 Feb 2015

Man, there was some serious buzz around Aunty Donna prior to their short run of shows; I had pencilled them in on the strength of the word “absurd” in their ‘Guide précis, but I got the feeling soon after taking my seat (in a packed Perske Pavilion) that Aunty Donna were really well known.

Apparently, they’ve got a heap of people following them online, or something.

So it turns out that Aunty Donna do sketch comedy… and it’s super polished. The three members of the group – Zachary Ruane, Broden Kelly, and Mark Samual Bonanno – have a wonderful chemistry, and they have their sketches down cold. And – better still – they like to dabble with some unconventional ideas.

Sure, there’s the occasional material that isn’t weird – but parental text messages are the closest Aunty Donna come to conventional. The rest of the time, their sketches are fractured by non sequiturs or just change direction abruptly. But everything just works: songs, sketches, a water fight…

I was bloody impressed by Aunty Donna… but then I started digging on their YouTube Channel. And bugger me if this isn’t the best thing ever. Consider me a devotee.

[2015065] Everything Is Under Control

[2015065] Everything Is Under Control

Angela Yeoh @ Gluttony – Pigtails

5:20pm, Sun 22 Feb 2015

After my previous show started late, I was left with a tight fifteen minutes to get from the Channel 9 Studios in North Adelaide to Gluttony. I must admit that I thought about grabbing a taxi, but I eventually decided on performing the only reasonable option on a forty degree day: I ran between venues.

So… I made it on time, and the extreme heat of the day meant that everyone else in the barely-double-digits crowd were sweating like pigs, too, so I didn’t look too out-of-place.

Angela Yeoh left her career in (serious) journalism to train with Philippe Gaulier… and, in the opening moments of Everything Is Under Control, I was really wondering whether she’d done the right thing. Yeoh’s clown – a black top & mouse ears, red-with-white-dots skirt, and red clown nose – seemed completely lost onstage, with faltering speech and a wandering focus. Everything seemed half-thought-out, half arsed…

…until she started bringing people up onstage. And it wasn’t for anything elaborate – the audience involvement was actually really tame and limited. Safe, even.

But there was something in the way that she handled those interactions that totally got me onboard.

Thereafter, I delighted in every awkward moment of the show… whether it was a joke that fell flat, or a stumble onstage, or an over-elaborate setup that suggested that Yeoh suffered from OCD… I just assumed it was all intentional, and I laughed my arse off. Yeoh’s clown is less a physical mischief-maker than an awkward tragic… and she plays with that awkwardness, presenting it to the audience to deal with (or not, as was the case with much of the crowd).

I hung around and had a really lovely chat with Yeoh after the show… mainly about being able to ditch your “safe” career and chase your dreams. I am so madly, deeply envious that she had the courage to do that for herself; but, on the back of my experience with Everything Is Under Control, I am also thankful she did.

[2015064] The Bureau of Complaints

[2015064] The Bureau of Complaints

AJZ Productions @ Channel 9 Kevin Crease Studios

4:00pm, Sun 22 Feb 2015

So – 4pm had come and gone, and the large audience that had gathered for this premiere of Alirio Zavarce’s latest work were sweltering under the water misters that were providing little relief, but plenty of additional humidity. I hear through the grapevine that entry to the venue was being held back to allow reviewers from The Advertiser to arrive… and I start fretting about how I’m going to get to my next show.

Once we were shunted inside (oh blessed air conditioning!), Alirio Zavarce and Matt Crook appear to much fanfare and introduce the premise of the show: to take the public’s complaints onboard. To that end, there’s a lot of vox pop videos where people air their grievances, as well as (disappointingly few) comments from their specially-commissioned “Confession Booth”, which clearly hadn’t seen too much use from the public. And that’s a shame, since I got the feeling that the Confession Booth was supposed to be the core of the show, with the Bureau responding to the Booth’s complainants.

But, in the absence of more material from the public, there’s a few asides about the need to facilitate the venting of complaint in society, as well as tips on how to be successful with complaints: Chris Crocker’s Leave Brittany Alone meme-trigger was used as a counter-example. And what arts performance about public dissatisfaction would be complete without some soft jabs at political complaints? (Tony Abbott is such a soft – but deserving – target!)

In their trench-coats and trilbies, Zavarce and Crook look the part as agents of The Bureau of Complaints, but when the biggest public complaint (lodged thus far) is about those little stickers on apples, then you have to question the Bureau’s usefulness.

In short: this was a fun idea, but – rather than seeing the premiere of this production – I wish I’d seen it at the end of its season (by which time, one would hope, there would be meatier material to work with).

[2015063] Smashed

[2015063] Smashed

Gandini Juggling @ Royal Croquet Club – The Panama Club

2:00pm, Sun 22 Feb 2015

It’s hot. Really hot. 40-odd degrees hot. And it’s the middle of the afternoon and I’m going to see a show in a tent with a heap of Other People. And lots of the Other People are not pleased with the conditions. “Why isn’t the air conditioning on?” asks someone who stopped studying mathematics before they got to “volumes”. “They should have turned the air-con on sooner,” barked a certain ex-Parliamentarian to a Croquet Club worker who almost certainly couldn’t do anything about the weather.

Anyway.

The staging at the start of the performance was intriguing: nine chairs at the rear of the stage, equally spaced, with rows of apples stretching out in front of them. More apples were piled at the sides. And when the this particular troupe of Gandini jugglers took to the stage (Gandini has multiple groups performing Smashed around the world), they wore fixed grins and were remarkably in time.

And I thought to myself – hang on. Is this juggling? Is this dance? What section was this under in the ‘Guide, again? (Answer: Circus)

But – perfectly in sync, grins locked – the cast started scooping up apples as they walked across the stage… and started juggling. Solo, groups, one-handed, two-handed, amidst acrobatic grabs… they juggled. They juggled well, and the apples were arcing across the black stage backdrop in a spectacular visual display. That the performers themselves were immaculately presented (suits and vests for the men, elegant dresses for the women) only added to the spectacle.

Somehow, with no real spoken parts, they manage to weave something approaching a narrative into their tightly choreographed juggling/movement routine… and it reaches a crescendo when the apples start being hurled around the stage, shattering on impact… and the plates (that had snuck their way onstage during one of the more narrative moments) started getting smashed, too.

And I suddenly realised where the name of the show came from.

I loved Smashed. The juggling was pretty polished (not super polished, mind you – there were a few spills), and the direction (choreography?) of the performers ticked all my boxes. But oh, to have seen this performance in a more temperate venue…