Royal Road of Dreams
Lorna, Declan and Matthew @ Higher Ground
5:00pm, Wed 8 Mar 2006
Wow… this was really, really odd. It’s also the first thing I’ve seen inside Higher Ground, the old IMAX theatre complex – it looks to be a decent casual venue, with wide steps just aching for tiered lounging. For this performance, however, we were stuck on rickety chairs down the front.
It opens… weird-like. A petite female, bearded-hippie-stereotype male, and a blind flautist appeared for a bit of a musical bit. They then congregate on the compass-points of a circle and greet the spirits.
Ummm…
They leave the stage. The girl and blind-guy reappear; he plays flute, whilst she dances with a snake. Ummm… she then does a little gymnastic routine that, by the standards set at the Garden, is thoroughly unspectacular. Then bearded-guy comes back onstage, dressed as a 4-metre-tall giant. He (the giant) plays the drums for a bit, with flute accompaniment, and then the trio return to their compass points and thank the spirits. Blind-guy and girl do, anyway – the giant remains mute.
This was the opening night for Royal Road, and they obviously had a bit of prep work to do – but starting twenty minutes late, they still managed to finish on time. Which is admirable. But, to be honest… I haven’t got the faintest fucking clue what the point of this performance was. Not a single idea. None. It just felt like I was sitting in on someone’s private religious worship ceremony. Which is kind of… icky. And wrong.