Clowns are physical, funny, sad and even sometimes sinister. These two highly trained and talented clowns were all of these things in this non-stop riot of a show that is wonderfully directed by John Nicholson. Slapstick follows mime, follows pathos, follows audience participation, and even a puppet show. Nothing goes on for too long and the pace is remarkable. You can only wonder at the inventiveness of it all.
It is a classic old trick for one actor to put strings on the arms of another and use him as a puppet, but on this occasion, remarkably, it happens also while he has dinner with a member of the audience who the clown actor has fallen in love with. The dinner is taken on a cardboard table with cardboard plates and glasses. In fact the whole set is cardboard and it is beautiful, especially set against the muted colours of the clown costumes reminiscent of classic prisoner uniforms. The clowns are imprisoned in a cardboard world and the audience is their only way out.
There are moments when the clowns are completely still and just a few small movements of the face produce guffaws of laughter from the audience. There is a wonderful repetition of the story in a kind of refrain, which is seen again towards the end with small puppets reminiscent of Punch and Judy with all the connotations of domestic violence that that show contains. There is a cardboard tank, a cardboard puppet theatre and a cardboard cowboy hat. The cardboard world of these two brilliant clowns who several times are controlled by an outside force in a remarkable puppet dance, is a complete pleasure to watch as it moves seamlessly from the sinister to the touching, to the outright hilarious.
I just hope that this show gets the audience it deserves. It is highly recommended and nobody need be put off by the idea of audience participation as it is always gentle and at the actors’ not the audience’s expense. The performance and technical direction is slick but the show has that element of real theatre (that perhaps one would expect in the Tobacco factory) where the audience is integral to the success of a piece that lasts just longer than an hour, and is over in a flash. What is there not to like unless you were to be offended by a bit of nudity and the odd four-letter word? Get on down there and enjoy yourself. ★★★★★ Keith Erskine 8th November 2016
