Tag Archives: Edinburgh Festival

SUITCASE SHOW

★★★★★

Edinburgh Festival Fringe

SUITCASE SHOW at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe

★★★★★

“takes a bunch of second hand materials of all kinds, and creates magic with them”

New Zealand Company Trick of the Light Theatre has made a career out of performing shows that leave as small an environmental footprint as possible. Suitcase Show shows how they remain true to that commitment. Everything is either second hand, or created from commonplace materials. Even the technical wizardry is economical, and designed to lessen the weight and number of personnel that had to travel to Edinburgh. As the show opens on a dimly lit stage, it’s not surprising to see a heap of battered suitcases neatly packed together. One is already opened, and inside, a record player’s turntable is slowly revolving as music plays. As more suitcases are opened, complex worlds in miniature emerge. And complex, intricate, life changing stories emerge alongside all this amazing design. But there’s an even bigger story tying these worlds together. The Traveller (Ralph McCubbin Howell) is at border control in an airport, facing a simultaneously bored and hostile baggage inspector (Hannah Smith).

What happens next is predictable enough. The baggage inspector tells the Traveller to open his suitcases. He refuses, but drops some unsettling information. Not only did The Traveller not pack them himself, he’s not even sure what’s in them. He repeatedly warns the baggage inspector that she won’t like what she finds. She doesn’t back down, even though her two colleagues are too busy playing cards to help. (They’re off stage, but we see them on video, played by Anya Tate-Manning and Richard Falkner). With one final warning, the Traveller opens a suitcase. It shows what looks like a diminutive Christmas village. With houses gradually lighting up, and a screen that shows silhouettes of tiny figures interacting inside one house. You could be forgiven for thinking that this is going to be a heart-warming Christmas story. You would be wrong.

No spoilers here, and I will only say that each suitcase reveals a different world, uniquely designed, with different performance skills to illuminate the tale. One story is told through the medium of two hands enacting the complete life story of two strangers who meet and fall in love on an airplane. Another uses shadows to tell the story of a bear, a train, and an escaping autocrat. You get the picture. What you won’t get, initially, is where this is all going, apart from the fact that it seems to be a series of loosely connected stories about traveling. And while we are being enchanted by all these suitcases and their stories, there is a more macabre drama brewing. When the Traveller’s identity is finally revealed, it will seem both offbeat, and somehow deeply appropriate. There’s also a grim video showing what happens to baggage checkers who ask too many questions. It that isn’t karma for all the times we’ve been stuck in airports going through baggage checks, I don’t know what is. I do know I won’t be asking searching questions of my fellow travellers any time soon.

Trick of the Light Theatre confirms that there is no end to the funny, quirky, deeply unsettling drama that has been emerging from New Zealand lately. And where would New Zealand films be without the extraordinary design and special effects that have revolutionized the industry? In its miniaturized, environmentally conscious way, Trick of the Light is doing something similar for theatre. Suitcase Show takes a bunch of second hand materials of all kinds, and creates magic with them. Director Hannah Smith and writer Ralph McCubbin Howell make a show from an absurdly mundane location and situation—equal parts humour and horror. But it’s the battered suitcases that reveal truths about life and death lurking in places you shouldn’t look. Then again, look you should, because every suitcase shows a story you won’t want to forget.


SUITCASE SHOW at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe – Summerhall – Old Lab

Reviewed on 13th August 2024

by Dominica Plummer

Photography by Rebekah de Roo

 

 


SUITCASE SHOW

SUITCASE SHOW

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THE SEX LIVES OF PUPPETS

★★★★

Edinburgh Festival Fringe

THE SEX LIVES OF PUPPETS at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe

★★★★

“it really is quite an eye-opener to see how many naughty positions the puppets can get themselves into”

I remember working on a puppet show a few years ago and one of the first things the puppetry director said to us was ‘don’t make the puppets do sex acts, ever’. She’d clearly never seen (or wasn’t a fan of) Avenue Q, and I imagine would be walking out of this show in protest. Clearly, Blind Summit are working with a different team and principles altogether, as this puppet show is pretty much just sex (although actually mostly just puppets talking about sex, until the big puppet orgy in the last scene, where it really hits its climax!).

Directed by Ben Keaton and Mark Down, and performed by four brilliant puppeteers (Lucy Lichfield, Isobel Griffiths, Briony O’Callaghan and Dale Wylde), the show takes the format of a series of interviews-to-camera, set up in a photoshoot studio with a white backdrop, each interview consisting of one or two puppet characters, sometimes responding to a question or other times just talking about their relationships. We meet a varied range of people, from the very posh and proper Dmitri and his wife to Katie and Helen, a lesbian couple telling about their experience of a ‘cum blob’.

Each of the performers are incredibly versatile, taking on different accent and voices and finding the very detailed movement and quality of each of the characters. Harry and Frankie are an older couple from New York, Frankie looking a bit like Edna Mode, with dark shiny black hair which she flirtatiously strokes her finger through when things are getting flirty. It’s this sort of detail which really shows off the skill of these performers, and of their directors.

Of course, the success of this show is also very much down to the design brilliance of Russell Dean, who puts so much care and attention to detail into each of the puppets. From Harry’s long tie which hangs below his waistband to Cockney-geezer Clive’s leather jacket, there’s no item, colour or material out of place. Each puppet moves freely with every slight breath or gesture from the puppeteers, allowing the audience to really forget that the puppets aren’t actually alive at all.

Whilst most of the show plays for comedy, there are also some really touching moments, as characters reveal intimate details about themselves, their loneliness or desires. There are also a couple of scenes which have more serious tones. These sometimes feel a little out of place in the rest of the show, but it’s nice to see the versatility of emotion that the puppets are capable off.

The final scene is a hilariously choreographed puppet orgy, and it really is quite an eye-opener to see how many naughty positions the puppets can get themselves into. If you’re looking for some outrageous puppet comedy, with a little bit of heart along the way, then this will be the perfect show for you.


THE SEX LIVES OF PUPPETS at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe – Pleasance Courtyard – Beyond

Reviewed on 12th August 2024

by Joseph Dunitz

Photography by Mark Down

 

 


THE SEX LIVES OF PUPPETS

THE SEX LIVES OF PUPPETS

CLICK HERE TO SEE ALL OUR REVIEWS FROM EDINBURGH 2024