★★★★
Interactive Theatre International. Terrace Ballroom at Stamford Plaza Adelaide. 21 Feb 2020
There would be few people in the Anglophile universe who would not know the jist of the hit BBC TV series, Fawlty Towers. An amazing achievement, given that there were only twelve episodes shown in only two years, 1975 and 1979. In 2000, the show was numero uno in the 100 Greatest British Television Programmes list drawn up by the British Film Institute, and in 2019, it was named the "greatest ever British TV sitcom" by a panel of comedy experts compiled by the Radio Times. John Cleese and his American-born British wife at the time, Connie Booth, modelled Basil Fawlty on a hotel proprietor they encountered while filming on location for Monty Python. John Cleese famously played the snobbish, tense and rude hotelier.
Interactive Theatre International first presented Faulty Towers The Dining Experience in Brisbane in 1997 and never looked back. The show had a sold-out London premiere in 2009 (talk about taking coals to Newcastle), tours all over Australia and appears in 20 countries every year. It’s played at the Adelaide Fringe I don’t know how many years.
The fan, or if there are such things, the uninitiated, will love it. Everything you might expect is included in the generous two-and-a-half hour show complete with a three course meal followed by coffee or tea (buy your own drinks). Rob Langston comfortably fits the Cleese bill with his physically and emotionally domineering Basil. Basil is abrasive to the audience, to its delight, and frustratingly feeds Manuel his opportunities to mangle meaning. You see, Manuel the waiter – played with irresistibility by Anthony Sottile - is Spanish with a deaf ear for English, and his interpretations of phrases whose meanings we take for granted are invariably hilarious and expressed with unsuppressed physical comedy. Rebecca Fortuna - playing Basil’s wife, Sybil - is a newby to the Interactive Theatre International company and looks like she has a job for life if she wants it. Her diminutive Sybil made the towering Basil cower and cringe. A suitably unusual voice affectation brought the house down with her rendition of Happy Birthday. The show does not seem to have an author; the actors are guided by the TV series, previous Interactive Theatre International interpreters and their own improvisations. Langston outperforms near the end of the show with some classic Cleese.
The Terrace Ballroom at the Stamford Plaza Adelaide lacked atmosphere and the company doesn’t bother to decorate either. Food service was beautifully timed with the comedy. The show is highly interactive – it’s like being on the TV set. Tables of eight engender lively discussion and at some point you’re likely to be part of the show. There are many surprises and it’s all huge fun being at the mercy of these wonderful characters and actors.
David Grybowski
When: 23 Feb to 15 Mar
Where: Terrace Ballroom at Stamford Plaza Adelaide
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au
★★★
Adelaide Fringe. The Octagon at Gluttony. 22 Feb 2020
Presented by Melbourne based company Head First Acrobats, Circus’Cision is another event in the seemingly ever increasing and popular genre of Circus and Physical Theatre. With many such events to choose from, punters are looking for a point of difference to encourage them to choose one event over another.
Circus’Cision has one point of difference – four of the cast, who are all buff and beautifully built lads, get there full kit off (yes, everything) and spend five hilarious minutes performing to Tchaikovsky’s Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy while trying to hide their ample packages from the sustained and direct view of the audience. They go to great pains, literally, to give as many fleeting glimpses as possible, which is the whole point really, and the audience laps up the good humour of it all. Guys in the audience have tears in their eyes, and so do the gals, but for different reasons. (At this point the title of the show makes sense!)
There are many of the other usual circus suspects on display: hoop tossing and swirling; aerial strap work (including what almost amounts to a suicidal death drop – scarily impressive!); juggling an impressive number of balls, as well as 10-pin skittles with an umbrella!; seemingly impossible and painful body balancing tricks; contortionist antics; a choreographed sexually ambivalent body balancing nod to Game of Thrones; and more.
An amount of this, or similar, has been seen in other events and in other festivals. What makes this show different is the Sugar Plum Fairy routine and the sexy and cheeky patter of the MC. He doesn’t provide a narrative to give the show a sense of coherence, because it’s not that type of show – he simply exposes the show (pun intended) for what it is: a tongue in cheek good-fun time with impressive bodies and circus tricks.
Kym Clayton
When: 22 Feb to 14 Mar
Where: The Octagon at Gluttony
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au
★★★★★
Adelaide Fringe. Regal Theatre. 22 Feb 2020
Sometimes one is born into a squad; sometimes one becomes a made-man through the influence of a squadfather. Such was the case for Ben Roberts and the goodfellas he hangs with. In this production, the Ukelele Death Squad pay homage to their musical muse (if I can mangle the metaphors) Bruce Riley. Not that Bruce was a maestro of the instrument, but without him turning up to Ben’s guitar lessons and asking to learn ukelele, Ben may never have picked one up himself. And thus, serendipity reared its lovely head, and the amazing musical experience that is the Death Squad was formed.
Beginning the show with a filmed tribute to the late Riley, the band doesn’t take long to kick into gear. And there is no tip-toeing through the tulips going on here. It’s loud, it’s raucous and it’s really bloody good. Jackets come off, ties are loosened and the ubiquitous beards get, well, sweaty.
Vocalist Mathew Turner (who is allowed to play the throat but hasn’t yet been trusted with his own weapon) fronts some great songs: the Squad play quite a bit of original material from their debut recording but mix it up with some well-known tunes (Misirlou, Streets of Philadelphia). There’s a mix of musical styles as befits the glorious instrument, and each is played with the gusto, or sensitivity it deserves. A particular highlight: the original Home, a beautiful original song that brought a tear to the eye.
A mark of performance skill is in the way artists react to the audience; in this instance a melodic heckle about “lobster days and lobster nights” started up a call and refrain (with slight return) throughout the performance, with crustaceans being referenced with gay abandon.
A great acapella performance of Black Velvet Band gave us the singalong of the evening, and a raucous, dance-along medley of pop songs rounded out the night, complete with dancing in the aisles.
Ah, squaddies, we are not worthy. Unmissable.
Arna Eyers-White
DISCLAIMER: This reviewer is a ukulele player and may have a slightly biased view of the production. But she doesn’t think so.
When: 14 Mar
Where: Regal Theatre
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au
★★★★★
Adelaide Fringe. The Gilded Balloon and Red Book Theatre in association with Holden Street Theatres. The Arch, Holden Street Theatres. 21 Feb 2020
This is the theatre of goosebumps. Henry Naylor returns to the Fringe with a fourth searingly poignant political play in his Arabian-Nights series, this one referencing ISIS and its cruelty to Syria. The play springboards from the English media rebound to the story of Shamima Begum, a teenage girl who wanted to come home after disappearing to Syria as a jihadi bride. Hence, narrator of this play is a tabloid journalist who is under editorial pressure to deliver a hostile keep-her-out story. The journalist, however, thrilled to escape from yet more beat-ups about Meghan Markle’s father, has other sensationalist ideas as she hunts down an embittered and traumatised returned soldier in his militaria shop. Naylor elevates the media currency of the play by having the journalist describing the writing process and the exchanges with her tawdry editor as her relationship with the former Army officer evolves. The result is an eruption of brutal truths. It is intensely harrowing, or would be were it not sheathed in the remarkable beauty of Henry Naylor’s prose and delivered by a splendour of fine performances.
Nicholas Boulton, a handsome Englishman of superb stage voice and Aoife Lennon, an elegant Irish actress, command the stage under Louise Skaaning’s perceptive direction. It is a potent experience, a chilling and heartbreaking meditation on man’s inhumanity to man, underscored by a wildly symbolic torrent of arachnophobia.
Samela Harris
When: 21 Feb to 15 Mar
Where: The Arch, Holden Street Theatres
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au
★★★
The Ultimate Australian Playlist. Gospo Collective. Cornucopia, Gluttony. 20 Feb 2020
When an Australian hits show opens with John Farnham’s You’re the Voice, you have to figure they’re very confident they can keep the hits up. Under the guidance of choral director Charmaine Jones, the Gospo Collective backed by the fifty-odd strong choir delivers songs from the past six decades without letting up.
The Seekers Georgy Girl nodded early to the sixties and the hits didn’t stop. Some cleverly arranged mashups (“oh, was that a line from Powderfinger dropped in there?”) set the level early, and a full house, primarily a family audience, showed loud appreciation for each reveal.
Each of the vocalists had their moment to shine, and shine they did, even showing a fair hand at The Hilltop Hoods The Nosebleed Section. Cold Chisel, INXS, Kylie Minogue and the BeeGees all got a guernsey, mashed up and tossed out with perfect timing. It should probably be noted however that Crowded House is not an Australian band, much as we might like to claim them!
The show’s pace barely falters; there’s a small vignette where they gather round the piano without the backing choir and the (often too loud) band, but for the most part it’s loud, fast and relentless. Even Wendy Matthews’ The Day You Went Away gets the full treatment, rather losing the effect that such a poignant song usually has on the listener.
The less said about the costumes the better; suffice to say, Olivia Newton-John’s seventies’ hit Xanadu suited the image perfectly.
An entertaining – if exhausting – night of song.
Arna Eyers-White
When: 21 Feb to 15 Mar
Where: Cornucopia, Gluttony
Bookings: adelaidefringe.com.au