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★★★★★

“brilliant, high octane, physical theatre at its absolute best”

The Camden Fringe has delivered a smorgasbord of delights this year and as it enters its final week, plenty more shows are still on offer.

Rendered Retina bring us the award winning Form, a comedy based around the mundane goings of three workers in a typical office. Not necessarily a plot line to set the pulse racing, but this is all delivered through the medium of mime, clowning and ingeniously clever object manipulation.

The set consists of an office desk dressed with the usual accessories and fourteen boxes filled with scrunched up balls of paper.

Some plays have a thousand lines of dialogue and yet nothing of substance is said. Here, not a single word is spoken and yet we are made to laugh and question how our working routine dominates our lives. The three performers (Tom Mangan, Alex Mangan and Jordan Choi) are all equally skilled. The ongoing choreography is lightning fast and yet synchronised to the split second. Movement is exaggerated, sharp and accompanied by terrific facial expression. The original music score complemented each of the scenes cleverly and heightened the story telling that the actors were so wittily putting across.

Scene changes can often be so clunky and yet no black outs and scraping of furniture here, instead locations changed before our eyes. Often they were so subtle and slickly carried out, that you almost didn’t notice it happening right in front of you. There we were, transformed to an operating theatre, a prison cell or an underwater setting. Props used in these scenes were genius, again they suddenly appeared out of nowhere, were imaginative and yet fitted the setting perfectly. We were promised twenty thousand balls of screwed up paper and that’s what we got. Inventively used in a variety of scenes, the one single ball of red paper caught the eye like a laser and again moved around the stage with a deft slightness of hand. At the end of the show, the stage was littered with these paper balls and yet this company is so accomplished, you feel that each and every one probably ended up no more than inch from where it should have been.

This is brilliant, high octane, physical theatre at its absolute best. An original concept and put together in a humorous, thought provoking, imaginative way by an immensely talented team. As the dust settles and I return to my mundane desk job tomorrow, whenever I have cause to use my desk stapler, I think a fond smile will creep across my face.

Reviewed by Chris White

Photography by Lindsay Oliver

[ Title of Show ]

Moors Bar Theatre

Reviewed – 7th August 2019

★★★

“This play does carry a strong message, which director Eleanor Felton expertly highlights”

The Camden Fringe promotes itself as a chance to see edgy, experimental and brand new theatre. To be invited to see a show called [ title of show ] therefore didn’t raise much of an eyebrow, although I do wonder how many people bypass the play due to the ambiguity of the title. I however was intrigued and turned up with an open mind, an open notebook and a slightly puzzled expression on my face.

It turns out that this is the story of Jeff, Heidi, Hunter and Susan, writing a musical about Jeff, Heidi, Hunter and Susan. They give themselves three and a half weeks to write a script and submit it to a festival with the ultimate hope that it might be a hit and end up on Broadway. Not having a specific idea for a plot, they sit down to write the first things that come into their heads and to document for inclusion, all conversations that they hold.

The small, square stage was decorated by four simple, wooden chairs. These were well used and effortlessly moved around. The simple lighting was used to good effect.

An original idea for a script, a lot of the obvious gags were used early on and the dialogue did at times become a little repetitive, although many of the ‘under the breath’ quips were very nicely done particularly by Susan. Writing can be a tortuous, lonely task and watching people struggling for ideas to move their piece on, didn’t always make for the most compulsive viewing, despite us being told that ‘Writing should be as easy as a monkey driving a speedboat’!.

But this is a musical and any show from this genre will live or die by its musical numbers. Fortunately, the four strong cast (William Tippery, Charlotte Denton, Kieran Parrott and Alyssa LeClair) are all blessed with equally strong singing voices, the harmonies were a highlight and filled the room with the most gorgeous sounds, all under the expert accompaniment of Robert Hazle who was so skilled, that at times you never even noticed his on-point playing.

Highlights, were the opening number “No Title”, the delightful “Stuck In A Role Playing Me” the cleverly written and well delivered “Who Is Heidi, Who Is Susan” and the amusing “Unwanted Photo-Shoot”. Oddly, my only real issue with the music was the finale. A cracking, uplifting number was belted out and drew whoops and applause, only to be followed by a downbeat, final number which took the wind a little out of the sails.

The show ran out of steam a little in its final third, “I want to have substance. not fluff” one of the actors cried, a small amount of editing and a little more substance would in my opinion, help the show to roll along at a better pace.

I have to mention the ‘Relaxed Performance’ that this company are putting on this Friday afternoon for adults or young adults with autism or complex sensory needs. A lovely idea and I wish them every success with this venture.

This play does carry a strong message, which director Eleanor Felton expertly highlights. Be inspired to take a risk and do the thing that you’ve been wanting to do, do it for three weeks and then show somebody. You may have a gem?

Camden People’s Theatre

Reviewed – 19th August 2019

★★★★★

“brilliant, high octane, physical theatre at its absolute best”

The Camden Fringe has delivered a smorgasbord of delights this year and as it enters its final week, plenty more shows are still on offer.

Rendered Retina bring us the award winning Form, a comedy based around the mundane goings of three workers in a typical office. Not necessarily a plot line to set the pulse racing, but this is all delivered through the medium of mime, clowning and ingeniously clever object manipulation.

The set consists of an office desk dressed with the usual accessories and fourteen boxes filled with scrunched up balls of paper.

Reviewed by Chris White

Photography by Lindsay Oliver

Form

Camden People’s Theatre until 21st August as part of Camden Fringe 2019

Last ten shows reviewed at this venue:

Moors Bar Theatre

Reviewed – 7th August 2019

★★★

“This play does carry a strong message, which director Eleanor Felton expertly highlights”

The small, square stage was decorated by four simple, wooden chairs. These were well used and effortlessly moved around. The simple lighting was used to good effect.

The show ran out of steam a little in its final third, “I want to have substance. not fluff” one of the actors cried, a small amount of editing and a little more substance would in my opinion, help the show to roll along at a better pace.

I have to mention the ‘Relaxed Performance’ that this company are putting on this Friday afternoon for adults or young adults with autism or complex sensory needs. A lovely idea and I wish them every success with this venture.

This play does carry a strong message, which director Eleanor Felton expertly highlights. Be inspired to take a risk and do the thing that you’ve been wanting to do, do it for three weeks and then show somebody. You may have a gem?

Thank you Plan Z Theatre for an interesting evening, if anybody wants me, I’ll be available in three weeks time…

Reviewed by Chris White

Pictures by Joel M Photography

[ Title of Show ]

Moors Bar until 10th August as part of Camden Fringe 2019

Previous shows covered by this reviewer:

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