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Archive for the 'Reviews from 2005' Category

[Review] MacHomer

Tuesday, August 9th, 2005

Never trust anyone who updates Shakespeare for the kids. Well in that case never give Rick Miller anything responsible to do ever again, because hot diddly dawg this works… and then some. MacHomer takes the pop culture legend of the 17th century and collides him with the highly respected barometer of a more civilised time [...]

[Review] Scottish Ceilidh Dancing For Children

Tuesday, August 9th, 2005

When I was a young lad, TV’s were monochrome, music was scratch covers of The Beatles, and we were forced to learn “Scottish Dancing” by an aged teacher. When you have more boys than girls in a class, you know that a few weird mad kids were going to be paired up and one “would [...]

[Review] Anton Pick: Cats Like Cheese

Tuesday, August 9th, 2005

Late at night, far down the Royal Mile, lies the challenging performance of Anton Pick.
Imagine a beat poet reading in a steady tone of voice, measured against a metronome set up for a dirge… who’s just finished a truckload of cannabis. In his own words, Anton is attempting to push the audience, to see how [...]

[Review] The Happy

Tuesday, August 9th, 2005

As larger-than-life, primary-coloured kids’ entertainment goes, The Happy Gang are one of the brightest and boldest. This year’s show sees a lot of tartan, huge furry sporrans, a huger furry beastie and audience participation to make the grown-ups cringe.
The set at the Pleasance One is spartan to say the least, but the kids didn’t [...]

[Review] Mouse on the Stair: Les Liaisons Dangereuses

Monday, August 8th, 2005

Mouse on the Stair’s production of Les Liaisons Dangereuses presents itself as a study of the sinister. The corrupt battles against the moral in affairs of the heart, and in the backdrop of a war-torn Europe in this 1940s set adaptation of Pierre Chodleros de Laclos’ novel. With a stage framed by two [...]

[Review] Marshall Cordell and Remy Renoux: Monty Python’s Flying Circus

Sunday, August 7th, 2005

Taking on the comedy giants that were Monty Python is a daunting task. Performing some of Python’s most famous sketches in French is perhaps doubly ambitious when faced with a clearly expectant crowd.
Entering the auditorium a mist of dry ice clouds the seating and a gentle hubbub amongst the audience indicates towards two mountaineers [...]

[Review] Impresariaat Jacques Senf: The Ashton Brothers

Sunday, August 7th, 2005

This troop is closer than brothers: at times they are each other’s arms, legs and even genitalia. Blending circus skills and acrobatics with musical interludes and absurdist humour, there is plenty in this show to keep the audience guessing as well as laughing.
Within the rather austere surroundings of St George’s West the show takes [...]

[Review] Tim Vine - Current Puns

Saturday, August 6th, 2005

It was with a certain amount of trepidation that I sat down to Tim Vine’s “Current Puns” Show. Some comedians take time to build an elaborate story, fleshing our characters as they go along, building layer upon layer before executing the punch line with the skill of a sniper. Not Vine. He’s a machine gun [...]

[Review] Bill Hicks - Slight Return

Friday, August 5th, 2005

“I’m Bill Hicks, and I’m dead now.”
There are so many levels that this show works on. The first is the surface layer where Chas Early is doing a rather impressive cover/tribute of the late Bill Hicks. Going ever so slightly deeper is the idea that Early is channelling the spirit of Hicks back down to [...]

[Review] Punk Science: The Albert Einstein Experience

Friday, August 5th, 2005

The closing few minutes of this show proclaim that “Science Isn’t Fun,” but I beg to differ. 4 performers (or are they lecturers? Or stand-up artists? Possibly failed rock musicians?) take the dry topic of the discoveries of Albert Einstein, and weave them into a highly enjoyable hour of what could be described as a [...]