A prosaic description of this remarkable puppet would tell you that it is constructed from cane, leather and aluminium, that it weighs about 50 kilos, and that it is operated by three puppeteers. When it is stationary it is very obviously a puppet, for much of its supportive framework is visible, as are the puppeteers themselves. It does not have the kind of realism we would see in, say, an equestrian statue.
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★★★☆☆ The Wedding Singer is a cheery, feather-light musical that offers a tuneful evening of undemanding entertainment. Featuring twenty songs, many of them skilful pastiches of 1980s pop, it is certainly not lacking in music and dance. The songs are fine, but they come so thick and fast that they leave no time for any lengthy passages of dialogue, so it is a tribute to this show’s multi-talented cast that they succeed in creating distinctive personalities from relatively little material.
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★★★☆☆ Two gentlemen in dressing-gowns and nightcaps peer out nervously from behind a curtain. They appear reassured that they have an audience, so they emerge, resplendent now in rather garish outfits . . . The latter part of the show included a very satisfactory moose hunt, requiring a brave volunteer moose.
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★★★☆☆ Pugilist Specialist is undeniably a ‘wordy’ play. Shaplin is so keen to pack each line with a startling image or an amusing witticism that it all becomes rather static. It has a great deal to say about a whole range of topics, not the least being gender politics, but as a depiction of a ‘black ops’ mission it is often rather hard going.
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★★★★★ I really enjoyed We Are Ian, which is surprising, for I do not dance; never have, really. I suspected that I was the last person who should have been asked to review a show about the Acid House music of the 1980s . . .
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