Theatre

Africker in Hoxton and One-on-One in Battersea

Alan Hindle | Thursday 7 April, 2011 14:55

There’s a classic clown exercise known as “The Chicken in the Oven”, or sometimes called “Ladies and Gentleman: William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliette”. The clowns tumble over each other to present the finest performance ever of the great Bard’s masterpiece- but they have never seen the play, so they desperately fake it. Meanwhile, somewhere, a chicken is roasting to a blackened crisp and they keep popping off and on to keep an eye on it, probably watching it burn, because they’ve never cooked a chicken before either. Frankly, they haven’t a clue, but the last thing they want is for you to suspect anything is wrong.

Between 1881 and 1914 the various European powers fell over each other waving pie knives to carve up Africa and bring David Livingstone’s mantra of “Commerce, Christianity and Civilisation” to the poor savages they imagined living there. Unspeakable acts of barbarism and religion were perpetrated while resources were plundered to swell the British empire. But the generals, politicians and captains of industry were, like clowns, making it up as they went along, suppressing the locals while maintaining an illusion of benefice for the folks back home reading pithy, punchy, racist headlines in the tabloids of the day.

Freddy Syborn’s new play Afriker is populated with cartoon characters in papier mache animal hats that illustrate their inner natures. Bearing only the slightest resemblance to actual personages from Queen Victoria’s reign, they sing, dance and mouth summaries of history they either don’t understand or are just making up. Which, of course, is exactly how history is “made” . Winners blather and books make it true.

Occasionally the show works brilliantly as a satire of modern politicians and foreign policy. Unfortunately, its driving current of anger, however justifiable, means the jokes get bogged down with earnestness. The one black actor in the cast serves almost solely as the voice of reason so he doesn’t get to have any fun which might undermine the serious message. He becomes a justification, a resource to be used as moral fuel. The animal hats suggests the show also wants to be seen as a fable. It’s trying to be everything at once.

Afriker feels like a uni smoker, an improvised “my old man’s got a barn we can use” production blocked out the night before.

The performers are all fine and funny, but frenzied and flustered, let down by laissez faire direction and a script looser than a rollercoaster held together by paperclips. Reworked and tightened up there could be something here in the future. As an experiment it’s bold and admirable. as theatre it’s a fun mess, but still a mess.

Wandering Battersea Arts Centre is like roaming a series of semi-connected dreams. Each uniquely decorated room and corridor is a stage set awaiting a performance. Overblown sumo wrestlers bounce off each other on the balcony, bumbling kidnappers capture victims in the loudest, clumsiest manner possible, and it’s almost impossible to tell audience from performers.

Unfortunately, I arrived too late for my first show at One-on-One. My deepest apologies to Patrick Killoran. Failing to appear for his one-man show, Observation Deck, meant there were more bodies on stage than in seats by a factor of infinity.

Ushered into a broom closet featuring an upturned TV playing a devilishly disturbing Koko the Clown cartoon from the 1920s, I waited to see And Birds Fell From the Sky. Then, fitted with earphones and nightgoggles-come-personal-cinema, my senses were transported 10,000 years into the future. My guide here, a giant, menacing, mutant pigeon, assigned me… some… obscure mission, before rather irresponsibly placing me in the hands of a bunch of drunk clowns on a convoluted roadtrip through a nonsensical revolution. Completely immersed, Il Pixel Rosso’s production was an engrossing experience halfway between living a dream and sleeping through a movie.

Following a quick pint in the bar I went for a nap in Japan.

Arriving at You Only Live Twice (But Die Once) a hostess had me remove my shoes before entering the performance space. As with the broom closet of And Birds, this was a divider, helping to separate realities. Since the BAC itself is a divider I was now several degrees removed from the mundane world. From there I was led into a sparsely decorated room. Soothing incense was instantly calming, while a disembodied voice invited me to lie on a futon on the floor and relax. The voice told a bedtime story about a ninja, skilled in every way a ninja needs to be, except killing which, as her parents rightly worry, will limit future job opportunities.

Kazuko Hohki, creator of the cabaret company Frank Chickens, has fashioned a sweet and spare fairy tale and another total environment. I came out, feeling genuinely refreshed.

Down to the bar for another pint. I like this other world.

One-on-One is tailored to each spectator. A menu can be sampled like the tapas served in the theatre’s cafe. Six specifically commissioned “meals” vie with a dozen or more “snacks” to create a personalised theatrical meal that is challenging, or dreamy or, as I had, immersive. After my plays I found myself playing Annie Hall to a stranger’s Alvy Singer, shouting our lines over a tin-can telephone connected by string. Apparently, as scientific as such things seemed when I was a kid, they don’t actually work. But a great way to meet people!

A fairly magical evening, but one requiring several visits to absorb properly.

One-on-One Festival running until 9 April at Battersea Arts Centre

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