Low Down
One air balloon. Contents: One explorer, one hamster, one urn. Result: One fine play.
Review
"What's the colour of infatuation"? This is a play that poses more questions than it answers; it is full of ideas, overflowing with them; many of them are crammed onto the stage and into an hour and a bit, in a very high quality first outing by Three to a Room.
This is lush, uplifting, heart-warming work, never too sentimental, a heady mix of humour, storytelling, imagination and terrific dialogue and monologue.
As theatre, it becomes a little too crowded - both physically and conceptionally - but please don't let that lead you to think this is dense or heavy. It isn't. I wish more theatre was like this these days. It takes risks with what could have been a traditional story play. I'd have doubts over the use of a hamster-would-be-lemming, if it wasn't performed so brilliantly by Sophie Lampel. At times it is beautiful to watch, and always compelling to listen to.
Well done to Darragh Martin for writing such an engaging script; well done to Yvonne Warwick for creating such a vibrant and alive piece of theatre. Well done to the entire cast for setting the pace and atmosphere so consistently and for stepping so well into characters as diverse as the ghostly/imagined Ernest Shackleton, Amelia Earhart and Robert Scott.
Well done for the successful heart that pulses at the core if this show. The Colin-Firth-like Paul David-Goddard as James is an excellent (and marvellously restrained) foil for the free-spirited questing and fired will of Claire Glenn as Caitlin, coming to terms with loss and a search for the jounrey she needs to make to find herself. Well done for a play with a happy ending (so rare in theatre at large these days).
I loved this play - not just personally for its story - but for the zest and refreshing feel it brought to a piece of theatre. Unclutter the production a bit both physically and conceptionally, and it's a five star winner. Nevertheless, it's a FringeReview strong, strong, strong recommendation. Go see it.
Reviewed by PL 21st August 2007
