Category: ff2010

Inanimate Meets Rage

The Box City Theatre Company @ The Tuxedo Cat – Studio

8:30pm, Wed 24 Feb 2010

So – a chap I work with… well, let’s just call him The Hippie. Because that’s exactly what I do call him, as factually inaccurate as that may be. (And, curiously enough, this post marks one of the first times I’ve ever typed his name – and, oddly enough, I didn’t know whether I should go with “Hippy” or “Hippie”. I asked him which he preferred, and he gave me a look of mystified I-don’t-give-a-fuck-I-hate-it-anyway; so, a quick trip to GoogleFight has me plumping for The Hippie, reflecting the fact that he’s a contrarian bugger at the best of times).

Anyway, The Hippie is in a position where he signs my Staff Leave form, and as I submitted my application for time off over ff2010, he remarked that a friend of his was putting a show on. “Get me the details,” I said, “and I’ll try and squeeze it in.”

Thus, Inanimate Eats Rage became the centrepiece of this evening, the first show Scheduled: the one around which all others revolved.

Later, as I chatted with The Hippie just before knocking off work for the Festivals, I happened to ask: “So… how’s your mate coming along with his show?”

The answer filled me with a bit of trepidation – and excitement. “He’s had to do a fair bit of work,” The Hippie told me, “something to do with OH&S. He’s had to build a cage.”

And so the image of a cage is foremost in my mind as I wander into TuxCat’s Studio, taking a seat in the second row (as directed by my occularly-challenged companion). The Hippie and his Better Half are down the back, having a good laugh; Edwin reaches across the throng and tugs at my sleeve to say hello. The room is packed, the mood is jovial and expectant, and onstage is – yes – a cage. Well, more of a chicken coop, anyway, with the tight wire mesh wrapped around the structure.

And it appears, soon after starting the show, that we’re witness to an anger management session… with a twist. Our Hero has engaged in a little bit of road-rage and, rather than being treated with soothing tones and calming actions, he’s subjected to a ranting “therapist” who verbally assaults a front-row pacifist hippy (not The Hippie, but a more hipster version thereof) and encourages the venting of aggression. And into the cage they go, awkwardly donning safety specs before smashing the shit out of old stereo components, computers, phones… whatever. But these (often protracted) displays of violence against the inanimate, whilst bloody funny to watch, become almost cartoonish because of the safety requirements surrounding them – the elaborate cage, the insincere glasses.

A female patient introduced into the session about halfway through ups the ante significantly; the extra voice onstage raises volumes, raises tempers, and it becomes a very loud and violent affair. The finale owes more to Pulp Fiction than anything, with blood splatters accompanying the computer keys that had hit the front rows; an almost orgasmic climax to a show that revelled in rage.

Unfortunately, I had to dash off to my next show, so there was no time to mingle & chat with the cast & crew. The Hippie’s friend turned out to be writer/director Malcolm Sutton, who apparently founded The Box City Theatre Company in the UK before returning to settle in Adelaide; the flyer for Inanimate Eats Rage proudly states that it’s the company’s “first production outside of the UK” – The Hippie joked that it was probably their first production, full stop. Joking aside, the flyer also mentioned “think Quentin Tarantino meets Monty Python and you’ll be on the right track” – and that’s broadly accurate. But I’d also throw The Young Ones into that mix – the latter half of the show descended into a very anarchic, shouty blur, with extravagant – almost grinningly indulgent – violence a-plenty. And, believe me, that was a very good – and satisfying – thing.

Sargasm

Jon Brooks @ Rhino Room – Downstairs

6:30pm, Wed 24 Feb 2010

It’s a lovely afternoon, and I happen to be in the city a few hours before my first show of the day; up to the Tuxedo Cat I trundle, sinking a few beers whilst chatting to Nik Coppin. I’m in a joyous mood; the temperature is perfect and the early-evening Asahi slips down easily. Before too long I realise I’m almost late for the show, so I dash down the stairs and around the block to the hotter (and muggier) bar servicing the Downstairs area of the Rhino Room. Luckily there’s still time to grab a Corona before heading in.

It’s a reasonable crowd this evening, with perhaps a third of the seats filled. Jon Brooks introduces himself in a very low-key manner, briefly chatting about his former lives as a political staffer and journo, before presenting the fundamental underpinnings of his show: that sarcasm, correctly wielded, is a tool for discussing (and even uncovering) the truth, allowing safe traversal of traditionally social taboos.

And this premise is extremely interesting to me, both as an avid (over-)user of sarcasm, but also because of the political shadow this places on the rest of his act. Because, even as Brooks wanders into tales and observations that may be deemed “normal” standup material (there’s bogan jokes a-plenty, with the northern suburbs’ Space Torana being cited as a uniquely South Australian solution to the international problem of Space Junk – upon which there’s the expected deposit), there’s always the feeling that there’s a deeper meaning, another level to his jokes.

Yes, there were a few Indian Taxi Driver assault jokes, and a nod to AC/DC, that felt a bit below the intellectual level of the rest of the act. But when the pragmatic approach to religion was proposed, and Brooks starts cynically digging at the distraction of Festival Month on the State Election, you realise that this material is a cut above regular standup fare. The attack on advertising – with the recurring (and perfectly timed) Zoot! Review callbacks – was sheer genius.

Throughout, Brooks maintains a sort of detachment from his subject matter – gruff in approach and coarse in language, he manages to come across as an informed ocker Aussie bloke: a classic pub politico. But the presentation is misleading; as he carries on his secondary aim of “reclaiming” words from their inappropriate modern uses, the distanced delivery manages to pack a heavy punch.

UrbanDictionary, always the most reliable source of NSFW word definitions, manages to accurately (with regards to this show, anyway) define sargasm as “deriving far too much satisfaction from glibly berating another with sarcasm”. And Brooks clearly enjoys his work, loves sinking the boot in, and manages to get more than a little bit political to boot… and that all adds up to a pretty bloody good show.

Controlled Falling Project

ThisSideUp Acrobatics @ The Ringbox

11:30pm, Tue 23 Feb 2010

The Ringbox is only about half-full for this show; a pretty good crowd, all things considered. After all, it’s still early in the Fringe Season, it’s late on a Tuesday night, and it was a bit chilly out. The mob that did turn up, though, didn’t seem perturbed in the slightest… in fact, they were one of the most enthusiastic crowds I’d encountered so far.

Clearly they knew something about ThisSideUp Acrobatics. I had heard bugger all about them, attracted to the show by the promise of “a laboratory of acrobatic impossibilities” and an easy-to-manage timeslot. Still, I had a fantastic seat, the stage was littered with props that gave the air of a mad scientist’s lair, and the bubbling anticipation of the crowd swept me up.

Four characters strut onstage – a professor (whose exaggerated over-acting created a comical focus) and his three minions. Progress through the four “acts” of the performance is registered on the professor’s chalkboard, but the first act – a collection of tumbling and balance routines – failed to thrill… I felt like I’d seen it all yesterday, that there was nothing new here.

The rest of the crowd, though, ate it up.

The subsequent acts did manage to impress, however. There was some breathtaking stacked-chair balancing, more tumbling, brute-strength single-handed pole balances, and a bit of teamwork in their russian bar routines. Some ring work, flips and throws, and plenty of humour.

Linked together by the peripheral premise of a series of lab experiments, Controlled Falling Project is a superbly polished and stunningly presented acrobatic event. Sometimes, though, that just isn’t enough to satisfy. Throughout the show I felt surprisingly irritated by crowd around me constantly chirped about how amazing they thought the Project was; all I wanted to do was tell them about the stunning experience I had with Freefall, but I know my limits: I wouldn’t be able to explain why a bunch of tumbling youngsters, full of enthusiasm but smattered by mistakes, managed to capture my eyes and – more importantly – my emotions.

And that’s the thing that was lacking with my Controlled Falling Project experience – the emotion. Yes, it was all very wonderful to look at – and a noticeably more professional & polished production than Freefall – but it didn’t make a connection with me in the same way that Freefall did.

However, ThisSideUp also performed as part of the Smoke & Mirrors ensemble show in the recent Cabaret Festival, and my proximity to the stage during that performance made a massive difference. Sitting in the second row of that show, I was in a position where I could watch the ThisSideUp guys strain and sweat through large amounts of the same tricks; that closeness made everything more immediate, more personal. So there’s a lesson to learn there for me, I reckon: favour the proximity over the all-encompassing view, maybe?

Sound and Fury’s “Private Dick”

Sound and Fury @ Le Cascadeur

10:00pm, Tue 23 Feb 2010

An admission: Sound and Fury’s “Private Dick” was actually the first show to get bumped from The Shortlist onto the newly-created “On Second Thoughts…” section of my Scheduling Spreadsheet of Doom. Sound and Fury are great chaps – wonderfully friendly and personable – but I’ve always found their pun-laden work to be a little too… well, punny. Cheap. And the faux mistakes that seem to be in every show? Oooh, I hate them.

However, it was also the first show to get a reprieve, graduating from the “On Second Thoughts…” section thanks to awkward timeslots and a big gaping hole in the Schedule. And they are nice fellas, and I love the very idea of a Sound and Fury adventure inspired by film noir… and so, after a swift walk in from Norwood, I wind up sneaking into Le Cascadeur as the lads try to fire up the front couple of rows. I wind up sitting near the back next to another FringeFriend, Julie – it’s been awhile since I’d bumped into her (probably a whole year, I’d guesstimate).

The show opens with a cliffhanger – we’re privy to one of the closing scenes, the boys quickly backtrack to the beginning, and all the noir stereotypes are there: the drunken private-eye protagonist, the double-crossing female lead, and the lighting lends an authentic feel to the production. And, as expected, it’s incredibly pun-tacular. Here’s the thing, though: no-one seemed to mind… even (surprisingly) me. Sure, one section of the audience was almost screaming in delirium (a touch over-the-top, I thought), but – even with all the elements that usually piss me off (the constant laughing-at-themselves, for example) – this left me feeling not-annoyed. The fact that Julie and I were able to share an almost private chortle at the “Shaft” jokes (that fell flat with the rest of the audience) was an added bonus.

There’s some great singing in there (the three-part “It’s a [Man/Woman]’s World” is bloody brilliant), a great noir feel, and the audio & lighting cues were tighter than a duck’s chuff… it’s very much exactly the show I imagined when contemplating the phrase “Sound and Fury does noir”. Sure, they still do that faux mistake thing… but hey, that’s part of their raison d’être, and it keeps the audience happy. I’m just happy that it didn’t irritate the shit out of me… this time.

This Kind of Ruckus [FringeTIX]

version 1.0 inc. @ Norwood Concert Hall

8:00pm, Tue 23 Feb 2010

I arrive a fair bit early, and there’s only a few souls milling about – unsurprisingly, they’re all APAM folk. Many more arrive, seeking the artist discount available with the light-blue lanyard of the arts market. I chat with a couple of people prior to the show; comparing show notes, one chap was staggered at my current show count; it was a little like Jeremy Piven’s part in Grosse Pointe Blank – “forty-two shows, man! FORTY-TWO!”

So the arranged seating in the Concert Hall is maybe two-thirds full, the stage curtains are drawn, six (I could’ve sword there were six, though the programme only mentions five performers) seats in a row along the front of the stage. A man wanders onstage, settles in front of one of the chairs, presents some cheerleader’s pom-poms, and strikes a pose, rustling with a forced grin. Another figure comes out and does likewise, then another, and again… eventually all six chairs are fronted, and the figures collapse in them. A slackening of form, and suddenly they’re a group of friends in conversation.

One woman leads with a dangerous tale of a night out in the city, encountering the worst elements of man’s violence agains man. Assaults and chases and terror, identifying with a woman in danger and assisting her escape – before discovering that the woman is, herself, carrying a load of ice and is of considerable interest to the police… the victim is, indeed, a “bad guy”. The idea that a “bad guy” could be the focus of so much intended violence is the first conundrum that we are forced to consider; but, with the story over, the stage curtains open up.

I feel like we’re in a nightclub – but it’s more than that. There’s a woman dancing around, a guy checking her out, sizing her up, formulating a battle plan. He makes his move, dancing into her. You can feel the physical power play taking place in front of you, and it’s uncomfortable – it’s something that we’ve all probably seen before, but presented in such a stark manner (with video screens displaying the action – and responses – from many different angles) it’s deeply unnerving. More disturbing still is the woman lying on the floor at the front of the stage; there’s a man just sitting a short distance away, elbows on knees, staring at her. There’s no real menace on his face, but it’s certainly there in his presence; the forward lilt of his body makes him appear as if he’s looming over her still and slumped form. It’s ominous, and utterly creepy.

Then we’re thrust into a couples therapy situation. A guy – seemingly honest, friendly – attempting to communicate with a woman – shirking, skittish. An offstage therapist (and he’s literally offstage, sitting with us in the audience) chastises the man for his language, his physical projection… the scary thing is, I didn’t see anything wrong… at first. He corrects the language, following the directions given to him… but she still flinches at his approach.

And then we’re back in the nightclub, back into conversation, and it’s over – with Matthew Johns’ “apology” on The Footy Show playing in the background. I leave for another show, and as I strolled back into the City I remember thinking “that was all very interesting.” I make a few notes about the ominous nature of some of the pieces – that’s my key word, my memory jogger, “ominous” – and let it sit at the back of my mind.

And it’s only now, typing this up in the Norwood Library on my birthday, that I realise the latent power in the work. Because right now I’m feeling like it was a violent performance; but I don’t actually remember anything overtly violent about it. And therein lies the point, the crux of the matter; maybe there was some physical violence displayed, but I’m so blasé about it that it didn’t register as “important” to my memory. Or maybe the inference of verbalised violence has taken a fortnight to sink in?

Either way, that’s a pretty sad indictment on me – but I don’t really know whether it’s an indictment on society per se, because who can say what’s shaped me this way? And it’s only now, after feeling like I’ve been kicked in the guts by this realisation, that I remember the single most overtly vicious conversation in Ruckus – a woman tells the throng about her “bad breakup” which resulted in her… rape?

And the fact that I threw the ellipsis & question mark in that sentence indicates what kind of a performance Ruckus is. Even the other characters onstage seemed to be debating whether to use ellipsi and question marks. It’s confronting, but politely so. It’s like those Jagermeister shots that don’t taste too bad going down, but kick you in the head later.

And so here I sit, thinking about my own response to these issues, second-guessing whether I am in any way sensitive or aware of how my actions may affect others. Because I can recognise some of those “innocent” behaviours as my own – but without thinking that they could be seen as “sexually violent”. Hell, it even seems ludicrous now typing those words out in the context of the words before it, but the reality of those actions seen through the different lens that Ruckus provides leaves me head-spun and pondering.

Director David Williams’ notes in the programme make for delicious reading, in light of the above: “We hope that you enjoy the show tonight, although enjoy may not be the right word…” Christ. I actually thought I had enjoyed it, and now I find myself questioning my own behaviour, comparing myself to an offensive testosterone-inflated sexist twat… two weeks later. Two weeks: it’s the show that doesn’t stop… it’s still going on in my head.

And, a few hours after I realised and felt and wrote the above, I walked in to see Bully. Talk about an emotional double-whammy.

Tommy Dassalo – An Explosion of Colours [FringeTIX]

Tommy Dassalo @ The Tuxedo Cat – Studio

6:00pm, Tue 23 Feb 2010

This has been a bit of a weird year for me, planning-wise; I scheduled all of my Festival shows very late and, rather than booking all my Fringe shows a week in advance (as I have been wont to do in the past), I seem to be doing my scheduling two days at a time, picking up tickets in wussy batches of sevens or eights.

The Scheduling for this Tuesday was predicated around one show; everything else was at the mercy of that single, inconveniently-timed-and-placed event. Frantically squeezing in Shortlisted shows around it, I’d originally selected Dooda for the 6:00pm timeslot – only to discover, upon picking up the ticket, that it wasn’t a six o’clock show at all, but 8:30pm. Which was, like, a bit shit, and revealed some horrible inconsistencies with my Scheduling that has led to me second-guess every subsequent planning decision.

So I plucked Dassalo from the Shortlist, snaffled a ticket, and donated my Dooda ticket to the TuxCat crew for free redistribution. Hopefully someone out there was able to take advantage of it.

But enough about me! There’s Tommy Dassalo to talk about.

As his bio points out, Dassalo has written a lot of comedy for TV – and it really shows in his act. He’s got a wealth of material that he whips through, intricate jokes with massive amounts of crossover and clever callbacks. There’s an element of – well, if not surrealism, certainly oddness – to his work, as evidenced by his father’s dog-biscuit & balloon escapades, and Tommy’s whimsical toilet-paper designs… but there’s plenty of (young) experiential material in there, too, such as his Wet’n’Wild escapades and “mature” friends’ less-than-escapades.

And this all sounds great so far: decent material goes a long way, especially from someone as young and earnest as Dassalo. But there’s a teensy-weensy little problem with his delivery, with the pacing of the material; the callbacks are really close together, often only a minute or two apart, and that really lessens their potential impact. The closing joke, however, is a brilliant example of a callback done right, reaching back twenty minutes or more to invoke the tale of being spooned by an ultrasound operator during his disease-investigation exploits.

So, at the end of the day, Tommy Dassalo proved himself to be an accomplished writer, but a fledgling standup comedian – but one with a lot of potential. And, as a last-minute ring-in show, I’m pretty happy with that. Mind you, I did have to resort to begging the other half-dozen audience members for one of their ticket stubs to maintain my collection for the year, which was a bit of a bizarre experience.

Sound Cinema [FringeTIX]

Bird Lantern @ The Deli

9:00pm, Mon 22 Feb 2010

I first saw Bird Lantern perform a set at The Jade Monkey two years ago, and was mightily impressed then; spying their name in The Guide was enough to warrant a place on The Shortlist, but reading the description – “a live re-scoring of silent, black and white films” – turned Sound Cinema into a must-see for me.

As, apparently, it did for many people; prospective punters were being turned away at the door in droves – this show, and the Tuesday night performance, were both sold out, and there were but a handful of tickets remaining for the third and final show. I wander out the back of The Deli, and it’s a very relaxed atmosphere… maybe forty or fifty people sitting around on benches, lounge chairs, rugs, cushions – just chilling, leaning towards the screen onto which we were going to be treated to some old silent classics.

I find myself sitting next to the film reviewer from The ‘Tiser, an amiable chap who occasionally whips out his phone to make a few notes. Bird Lantern (Greig Thomson and Al Thumm) introduce their concept to the crowd and fire up the first movie: Georges Méliès’ Le Voyage dans la Lune (Trip to the Moon) – a charmingly innocent film, rich in detail and – considering the fact that it’s over 100 years old now – technically impressive in its execution. The music underpinning this short (it’s a mere 8 minutes long) is laidback, some gentle grooves underpinning the frantic moon-men chase sequences punctuated by umbrella-smiting. Great stuff.

The main event, though, is Buster Keaton’s The General. It’s a really wonderful movie, though I couldn’t imagine what it would be like without the soundtrack that Bird Lantern provide – drivingly uptempo for Keaton’s brilliantly designed action sequences, dropping back to softly twee for the blank-faced romance scenes. The first plane to fly overhead seems to be perfectly timed to provide some extra oomph to the movie (and the soundtrack); unfortunately, subsequent flyovers are less considerate.

Sure, the boys had a few issues with the film restarting at a particular point (which looked like a problem with VLC to me). And Greig told me afterwards that they’d encountered a few discrepancies between their DVD copy of The General and the version they originally composed against. But it was a bloody great experience, watching these old movies reliant on their visual performances being underpinned by modern beats and loops.

(Greig also remembered me from that Jade Monkey gig two years ago, and had a couple of CDs of new creations for me to snaffle. How cool is that! :)