ff2013, Day 28

Oh hello! A bit tipsy, me.

  1. Chipolatas present ‘Gentlemen of the Road’
  2. Squaring The Wheel
  3. Dorothy Parker’s Sweet Release of Death
  4. Ben Darsow in 30 Minutes
  5. Abandoman – The Life and Rhymes of Abandoman
  6. Darkness and Light

Speck rolls from Pigs On Fire: good, but not worth the cash. Sapporo beer will be the death of me. Hot.

[2013018] Naked Unicorn Vomit

[2013018] Naked Unicorn Vomit

Nicole Henriksen @ Gluttony – The Runt

11:30pm, Sat 16 Feb 2013

A lot of things can attract me to a show. Sometimes it’s a known name, sometimes it’s a well-written (or just plain quirky) précis. And sometimes it’s a great show title.

I mean, Naked Unicorn Vomit. It’s perfect.

But I’ve no idea what to expect from the show itself – apart from “comedy”, that is. I’ve no idea who Nicole Henriksen is, I’ve no idea why she would plan such a short run of gigs. And I’ve got absolutely no idea why anyone would choose to use The Runt as a venue. It’s a horrid little space – a shipping container, 24 seats, a bench, and a sense of claustrophobia like no other venue.

And when Nicole Henriksen bursts into the venue, it’s pretty clear that she’s giving it everything she’s got – she’s bubbly and enthusiastic, with her high energy levels almost too much for the tiny venue. Her character sketch comedy is a little up-and-down, with an uncomfortable audience not really granting a lot of leeway to technical issues (as videos and songs occasionally go awry), but it’s the kind of stuff that leaves me smiling.

The opening character, Nicole Henriksensen, delivers some stand-up that falls a little flat, but the appearance of UK pop songstress Big Yellow Button (“Hit the button… the Big Yellow Button!”) really opened things up – her minimalist Why’d You Break Up With Me (or somesuch) was brilliant, with some really clever callback structures. Ex-talk-show host (and hopeless showbiz addict) NK was next, a gigglingly confused mess of a character, before things wrapped up with MC Misogynist and his eponymous songs like I Fucked Your Mum.

I quite enjoyed Naked Unicorn Vomit. Whilst the material overall was a bit patchy, the highs were most definitely quality material – and Henriksen is still young, with plenty of time to hone her craft. When I talked to her after the show (and many times in the days thereafter), she was adamant that this short run of shows was a great experience, and massively beneficial; I’ll certainly be keeping my eye out for her in the future.

ff2013, Day 27

So – we’re heading into the last seven days of this Festival season. Seven days to cram as much in as possible. And most of the stuff remaining on my Shortlist seems to intersect the two hours between 7:30 and 9:30; some tough choices are going to have to be made soon.

Also: ArtWalks. I need to do more ArtWalking. My quick stroll today only yielded half-a-dozen exhibitions.

  1. The Book of Loco
  2. Afternoon Fringe Showcase
  3. Rip Drag Ruminate
  4. MKA’s 22 Short Plays
  5. MKA’s SOMA
  6. Sketch The Rhyme

After missing Bushpig yesterday and getting caught up in a quagmire of “what if” thoughts, it was slightly satisfying to see The Book of Loco run long this afternoon – thus validating some of my decisions.

It was amusing that I read a tweet from the Fringe Office stating that the average temperature so far this Fringe is nearly 33 degrees just before I went into a packed Austral Red Room for their Afternoon Fringe Showcase; with a full house and closed doors, that room was a fucking sauna, making me yearn for a bearable 33 degrees.

ff2013, Day 26

So – today was my birthday. After treating myself to a Girls’ Generation trinket, I went on a blind date, watched some kids’ circus, wept uncontrollable tears of joy as a response to my favourite acrobats, studied for the afterlife, bailed on a show (due to poor scheduling on my part, and a running late/long knockout combo that – in hindsight – needn’t have mattered), watched a bizarre Benetton ad, partook in the latest Australian Eurowision Song Contest, and then wrapped things up with the world premiere of…

A Young Man Dressed As A Gorilla Dressed As An Old Man Sits Rocking In A Rocking Chair For Fifty-Six Minutes And Then Leaves, While On The Other Side Of The Planet Another Young Man Dressed As A Gorilla Dressed As An Old Man Sits Rocking In A Rocking Chair For Fifty-Six Minutes And Then Leaves.

‘Twas a pretty awesome birthday, really :)

  1. Blind Date
  2. Mr Shaggles Circus World
  3. A Simple Space
  4. I’m not pale, I’m dead.
  5. What the Body Does Not Remember
  6. Eurowision Adelaide 2013

I’m a bit bummed that I missed Bushpig, but them’s the breaks – I was trying to schedule shows with ten minutes of slip, and that’s just not really feasible (as it turns out). Still, the gaping hole in the evening’s schedule facilitated a nice favour for a good friend, and a bizarre re-meeting with Helen – who just happened to be sitting within one seat of me for the second night in a row. Adelaide!

ff2013, Day 25

Blimey – that there Van Dyke Parks show was… well, odd. Especially when I apparently tried to instigate a fight with someone (over recording an event that had – quite explicitly, several times – been stipulated as a non-recording event). So… yeah. That was interesting.

Thank christ Helen was there to talk to, though. That show would have been almost unbearable without her.

  1. Shakespeare for Kids
  2. Desperately Seeking the Exit
  3. Van Dyke Parks
  4. Andrew McClelland’s Hang the DJ

Anyway – it’s currently 3:35am on March the 9th. And you know what that means, right? My birthday.

But it’s not just me who should be celebrating; since discovering K-Pop last year, I’ve become enamoured with addicted to Girls’ Generation, whose nominal leader – Taeyeon – shares my birthday. That’s part of the reason she’s my bias of the group.

It could also be because she’s so cute :)

Taeyeon <3

Happy birthday Taeyeon! And me! :D

ff2013, Day 24

Another quiet day oh wait that’s another six shows am I ever going to write about all these things?

  1. Internal
  2. My Piano and Me
  3. Chris Knight’s fUNCOMFORTABLE
  4. Danny McGinlay: Hypertonic
  5. Play Actually – A Non Rom Com
  6. FACTY FACT – A Late Night Comedy Game Show

So – Internal, then. Every bit as personal as The Smile Off Your Face, but a little more… pointed, maybe? At various stages I felt uncomfortable, completely at ease, jealous, proud, and amazed. Quite a bizarre experience, made only more odd by my re-telling of the experience to friends late this evening… their questions really made me stop and consider all that had happened.

And I love that kind of challenge, I really do.

ff2013, Day 23

So… that’s the ton up for this year, then.

  1. One Man, Two Guvnors
  2. Echolalia
  3. Children / A Few Minutes of Lock
  4. Murder
  5. Wolf Creek: The Musical

One Man, Two Guvnors was an utterly bewildering experience. I laughed my arse off in the first half, right up until the “audience interaction” that preceded the interval; at that point, I genuinely thought that the production had crossed the invisible line that separates the audience from the performers, and I actually started feeling angry towards the production company… and myself. Whether or not that “audience” member was a plant makes no real difference; any goodwill towards the play evaporated at that point. Harrumph.

Murder, on the other hand, is worth it simply for the puppet-fucking.

[2013017] Dandyman

[2013017] Dandyman [FringeTIX]

Daniel Oldaker @ The Garden of Unearthly Delights – The Spare Room

9:45pm, Sat 16 Feb 2013

Occasionally you go to a performance that feels… well, unfinished. Like the performer is trialling some material out, evolving the show somewhat, with an eye towards delivering a more coherent experience at another Festival. This is usually most evident with comedians, who trial material and shape their show in Adelaide before migrating to the Melbourne International Comedy Festival.

But it’s somewhat rarer to find other performance pieces in such an embryonic form. Sure, when I saw last year Dr Brown admitted he was starting his show from scratch, but Dandyman felt even less prepared than that.

Daniel Oldaker’s character, dressed in a sky-blue suit with a bow-tie made of pink drinking straws, is certainly charming enough as he bumbles into The Spare Room and, through shoulder shrugs and smiles and quirky non-lingual vocalisations, tries to drag us into his somewhat vaudevillian world. He juggles balls and clubs; he fashions more straws into odd objects; he attempts to perform with a diabolo.

But Oldaker is clearly not at ease in the venue. He’s constantly looking upwards, unsure whether the stage has the height to permit the tricks he wants to perform; he even takes out a light globe during one constrained juggling attempt. It’s also evident that he’s not quite sure what he’s going to do next; this leaves the audience restless and uncomfortable, doubly so once the Dandyman decides to partially strip.

And maybe that’s the point – to make the audience feel out-of-sorts whilst being distracted by simple carnival tricks. But I can’t fathom what the deeper motivation behind such a decision would be; as a result, I left The Spare Room thinking that I’d just paid good money to watch someone else experiment with ideas of what could possibly, one day, be entertainment.

ff2013, Day 22

Whoops. 4:44am on a Tuesday night, and I’ve got a lunch catchup with friends and a matinée tomorrow. Erm, today.

  1. Thursday
  2. No Moral Compass
  3. Homage to Uncertainty
  4. Michael Hing – Occupy White People
  5. Nik Coppin is Not Racist
  6. Künt and the Gang

A surprisingly big day, in retrospect. It’s not often you can say “let’s crack out six shows today” on a Tuesday.

[2013016] Tim FitzHigham – The Gambler

[2013016] Tim FitzHigham – The Gambler [FringeTIX]

Tim FitzHigham @ The Garden of Unearthly Delights – The Cupola

8:15pm, Sat 16 Feb 2013

Plucked from the Fringe Guide for my Shortlist – a decision later validated by the recommendation of an old family friend – I admit to having had no idea who Tim FitzHigham was prior to entering The Cupola. With a quirkiness about the text of his précis, I figured he’d be a pretty safe bet.

After a long and amiable chat with people at the tail end of the queue, I wind up being the last punter in the tent, and take a seat in the penultimate row next to the tech’s desk. It’s a pretty bloody good crowd, and there’s no problems with visibility at this venue – FitzHigham regularly projects images and movies onto an elevated screen, and the man himself purposefully roams the width of the stage, directly addressing as many people as possible.

The Gambler focusses on FitzHigham’s fascination with the habit of gambling… but not normal gambling. He’s more interested in the wagers that people make with each other: that one man can cycle from London to Dover and back again before another can draw a million dots, for example. Weird betting – the types of wagers that you’d expect from eccentric Englishmen.

And that very much describes this show: it’s eccentric in the extreme. FitzHigham’s quirky personality – and passion for doing silly stuff (rowing the English Channel in a bathtub, for example) – certainly helps, but as he revisits his Top Ten Greatest Bets in History there’s plenty of eccentricity fodder.

FitzHigham races (on foot) a racehorse over one hundred yards; he wheels a barrow over 20 miles from Ware to Shoreditch; he reels in a mile of rope to facilitate access to the land he needs to attempt to roll a cheeseboard four miles in less than a hundred rolls. And, yes, the dots-versus-bicycle bet is tackled as well.

The Gambler is an enjoyable excursion, and it’s pretty easy to get swept up in the excitement as FitzHigham struggles to attain his self-imposed goals. His storytelling style is great, though I must admit to getting irked by his tendency to repeat small phrases for emphasis. But it’s a show that remains in the “quirky” bracket, rather than being “compulsory”.

ff2013, Day 21

Due to the Kronos show at Thebby, today was a bit tricky to schedule… it was a long show, awkwardly placed, and overran, too (with the same problem likely to occur with Van Dyke Parks on Friday). So just the three events today… a quiet one!

  1. Festival Fishbowl
  2. Kronos Quartet
  3. Sam Marzden’s History of Rock’n’Roll (1962-1989)

To be quite honest, I’m currently contemplating becoming a professional groupie for Zephyr Quartet; their performance with JG Thirwell’s Manorexia this evening (as “special guests” for Kronos) was quite amazing.

Also: it nearly broke my heart to be the only punter in Sam Marzden’s show this evening (along with two reviewers, a judge, and their comp partners). Please: if you’ve got any interest in rock music or folklore or storytelling, go see the show – it’s a really great script and a lot of fun.

[2013015] Kim Churchill

[2013015] Kim Churchill

Kim Churchill @ The Garden of Unearthly Delights – Paradiso

7:00pm, Sat 16 Feb 2013

One of the most mind-blowing musical experiences I’ve had in recent years was discovering The Tim McMillan Band; listening to (and watching) McMillan’s insanely fast hands dance around his guitar, picking and strumming and tapping and thumping the instrument to produce an incredibly exciting and cohesive song structure, is one of those experiences I’ll never forget. It completely redefined what is possible from one man and a guitar.

So when I saw Kim Churchill’s style described as explosive, with intricate fingerpicking, percussive beats on the body of the guitar, tapping intertwined with stomp box, powerful harmonica melodies and soulful voice, I figured he’d be following in McMillan’s footsteps – as a result, he was one of my earliest ticket purchases.

And whilst he opened up with a nice tune that allowed him to roam the fretboard and show off his white-soul vocals, there was no evidence of guitar-based percussion; instead, Churchill produced his beats using a single small kick-drum. Additional instrumentation came from his (treated) harmonica, which allowed him to venture into the one-man-band stereotype, and two accompanists who provided trumpet and (superb!) electric violin.

Churchill’s songs were really quite nice: peaceful tunes that just sorta existed and pleased my ears, without necessarily tricking my brain into emoting. His stage manner was also quite pleasant, and he’s comfortable with his blonde-haired surfie good looks – humble words and flashing smiles and gleaming eyes. Churchill provided, on most fronts, a professional presentation…

…except for one thing – which, for me, was a pretty major thing. In using his kick-drum, Churchill’s ability to keep time… well, wavered. I reckoned he’d stray around five BPM from his nominal target – not much, to be sure, but enough for me to actively notice it… and once my brain picks up on something like that, it refuses to let me ignore it. The fact that these timing variations didn’t throw his accompanists is of credit to them… but they shouldn’t really have had to deal with it.

So, despite some polished presentation and pleasant tunes, I left this performance disappointed. Disappointed that I didn’t see any McMillan-ish brilliance, and snobby-disappointed that the rest of the crowd hooted and cheered for someone who – my brain kept reminding me – couldn’t keep the beat.

[2013014] Memoirs of a Pageant Princess

[2013014] Memoirs of a Pageant Princess

Emma Khourey @ Gluttony – The Bally

5:30pm, Sat 16 Feb 2013

It’s late in the day – like, just before I entered The Bally – that I learned that performer Emma Kourey was pregnant… really pregnant. And as soon as she appears onstage in her Miss Wollongong persona, I started wondering whether she’s actually last the entire performance; despite the best efforts of the Bally staff and their multitude of electric and handheld fans, it was still bloody hot in that tent… and Khourey looked ready to burst.

To call Miss Wollongong dim would be an insult to five-watt lightbulbs. Whilst she attempts to mimic the traits of the beauty queens that have preceded her, she has trouble even dealing with scissors – her ribbon-cutting ceremony was almost like watching a dizzy kid attempt to pin the tail on the donkey. Opening with a photo display of her head photoshopped onto various less-than-flattering shots of Wollongong, this self-appointed Princess of Steel proceeded to demonstrate her “talents” to the small audience, before being distracted by her favourite things – sparkly butterflies, and “sparkly things in general”.

Her speech at an opening (that accompanied the ribbon-cutting) was a ditzy laugh, with her cue-cards being a poorly organised mess; and (of course) I was plucked from the crowd to act as a judge in a talent competition. After almost trashing the stage and then completely mis-reading the first cue-card (I read “My name is Steve, for example” and substituted my own name, which resulted in a puzzled frown from Miss Wollongong until I corrected my “mistake”), I got to quiz the Princess of Steel on her hopes and dreams… before feeding her spoons that she attempted to flip into a bowl on her head.

We went through a lot of spoons, but I got a commemorative Miss Wollongong teaspoon as a token of appreciation.

There’s a moment of sadness – leading to bleak laughs – as she reads out a letter from the officiating body of Pageant Princesses decrying her self-appointed status… but then there’s more sparkly things, and a happy – if ditzy – ending.

Look – it feels really awful to say anything negative about this performance; after all, it was a stinker of a day, and Khourey was heavily pregnant. But there’s no denying that transitions between scenes were slow and clunky, leading to a stop-start feeling in the show; I also got the feeling (and the press release suggested) that the show was supposed to be far more physical in nature, with some of those elements removed due to the impending birth. And whilst I’m happy to give anyone on a stage as much positivity as I can muster, by the end of the show I was almost worn out; Miss Wollongong would be a fun support character, but fifty minutes with her was almost too much.