EurobeatI’ve been lucky enough to see Eurobeat twice before. The first time, a friend of mine was over from Ireland for a few days, and we were sitting drinking in the Pleasance courtyard when we were accosted by a leafleter. Fairly well oiled, and both Eurovision fans, it didn’t take much to persuade us to give this Eurovision spoof a go. And we loved it. I loved it so much I went back to see it again at the Festival theatre, with more or less the same professional cast. This version was an amateur production, and what it lacked in polish it made up for in enthusiasm and effort.
Eurobeat is a spoof/pastiche/parody of Eurovision. I am a Eurovision fan – I love the naffess, the kitsch, the terribly political voting, the whole thing. But bobb is absolutely not a Eurovision fan, and he really liked it too. The show proceeds as if it was the actual Eurovision song contest, in Sarajevo, hosted by the glamorous Boyka and slightly creepy Sergei. A number of countries take part – Poland, Italy, Germany, Royaume-Uni, Russia, Hungary, Sweden, Ireland, Greece – performing their songs, and then there’s an interval while the audience get to vote by text for their favourite, and the hosts perform the traditional Eurovision voting entertainment (in this case, a song about a turnip). The professional version has Iceland as well, but Fringe shows are limited for time and so Iceland were missing from this.
Writers Craig Christie and Andrew Patterson are geniuses. SRSLY. The Eurobeat songs are such brilliant pastiches that they could almost be genuine entries. Russian boyband, Irish crooner singing “lalalalalala,” terrible UK entry, surreal German Kraftwerk-pop, Hungarian folk song about killing a chicken and eating its entrails, Swedish ABBA rip-off with a piano line ripped straight from Waterloo – it’s all perfect.
Eurobeat has quite a small cast, maybe 20 or so, so they take turns being singers and dancers for each of the countries. They have to work hard, learning several songs and interpretive dance routines each. The couple doing the UK song probably have one of the easiest jobs as going slightly off-key is just part of the act. This cast manage the songs well, although the dancing could be better, and the sound mix sometimes drowns the singing out with the music. After the songs comes the voting. This time Ireland won, but on both the previous times I saw it, Poland won.
If you love Eurovision for its own sake, or you enjoy laughing at it for its awfulness, then Eurobeat is worth a look. This wasn’t the best production of Eurobeat I’ve ever seen, but it was still utterly enjoyable and a whole lot of fun. 6.5/10
Mark Thomas - 100 Minor Acts of DissentI have a soft spot for Mark Thomas because years ago I was heavily involved in a campaign to stop the government building a replacement for the hospital I worked in via the PFI route rather than through public funding. Mark Thomas assisted us in that campaign, as did the late and much missed Paul Foot, and Jeremy Hardy. The campaign had no effect and the PFI deal has proved disastrous, but that’s by the by.
Tonight’s show, 100 Minor Acts of Dissent, is about Mark Thomas’s pledge to complete 100 minor acts of dissent between 14/05/13 and 14/05/14. These include such things as photographing police officers, stickering books in large booksellers with stickers that say “also available in charity shops” and taking a ceilidh band into the Apple store to protest the fact Apple don’t pay taxes in the UK, among others. Stickers and badges are available for sale after the shop, so take small change.
I would also like to draw your attention to this site
http://www.wewilldrivethemtotheairport.co.uk/ .
If you like intelligent comedy, you like a bit of mischief and you’re not appalled by people not behaving themselves, then you’ll probably really enjoy this show. I would give it 10/10 but there are some parts of the show where Mr Thomas speaks really quietly into the microphone and we couldn’t hear him, so 9/10. Now, I’m off to make use of my bastardtrade stickers.
Ben Moor- Each of UsOne of my most favouritest ever Fringe performers is Ben Moor. I saw his first one man play, It Takes Forever If You Go By Inertia in 1993, and I’ve seen every one since then. I think my favourites have been Twelve – any play which explains Bohemian Rhapsody is worth seeing – and Not Everything Is Significant, but I loved all of them. I was less keen on Black Cocktail, but that was written by Jonathan Carroll and didn’t have Ben’s off the wall delightfulness.
It’s really difficult to describe Ben Moor’s plays. They are touching and funny and quirky and sweet and melancholy and joyful and life-affirming and moving and beautiful. They’re set in all sorts of strange universes – competitive tree climbing, tightrope-walking around the world, nuisance phone calls and miniature Pope clones – but essentially they’re about love, hope, relationships and the possibility of second chances. One of the great things about seeing all of the plays, from 1993 onwards is that I’ve been able to watch Ben develop as a writer and as a performer. He has a wonderful face and he can use his whole body very expressively to convey emotions and actions and whole concepts, but over the years he’s toned that down. He seems to be a much more confident performer now, secure in the quality of the writing and not relying on the funny movements to get a laugh, just using them when they really add something to the show.
So, Each of Us. I liked this play, I enjoyed it very much, but it’s definitely not my favourite. It’s been 4 or 5 years since Ben brought a new play to the Fringe, but somehow something about this one feels rushed. The relationship between the narrator and Radium happens and then ends so quickly that you never get the chance to care about it, and the narrator just comes across as a bit of a numpty, and the two characters who appear later, whose names escape me, never really seem to have much point to them. The play is filled with Ben’s characteristic quirky and romantic touches, and has a joyfully hopeful cliffhanger ending, but something just didn’t click for me. I am pretty sure my employer has at least 5 corporate thwarters in every department though…
One of the central ideas in Each of Us is the idea that our souls, human souls, really exist in the memories and minds of the people we have met, the people whose lives have interacted. The idea that the memories people have of us ensure that we live on after our death has appeared in other plays of Ben’s – I’m sure it was Not Everything is Significant, but I could be misremembering. It’s a beautiful idea and it was used to great effect in whatever the other play was, but if feels a bit shoehorned-in here. I’m not sure what it was about Each of Us that didn’t really work for me, and a not-as-good-as-the-others Ben Moor play is still a great play, but I think I can only give it 8 out of 10.