Author Archives: Tara Boland

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About Tara Boland

A London based performer and theatre-maker working mainly in devised theatre and interactive performance, Tara has also worked extensively with children and young people as a workshop facilitator, director and writer and is interested in theatre for the young at heart, immersive theatre and theatre clown. She has performed at numerous venues, including BAC and The Old Vic Tunnels, and is currently training full-time in Lecoq method at the London International School of Performing Arts.

Mawaan Rizwan - Fluu

Mawaan Rizwan: Fluu

Mawaan Rizwan - FluuEastern promise meets Carry On. Mawaan Rizwan, whose sketches on Youtube have reached over 20 million views, emerges from behind the curtain with clothespegs attached to each finger like fake nail talons, wriggles seductively to Thai restaurant muzac, and proceeds to try, using the pegs, to pick popcorn out of a bag, throw it unsuccessfully into his own mouth and eventually the mouths of audience members. Stupidity doesn’t come much sillier or funnier than this.

Mawaan remains in traditional clown silence for the first half, miming out more and more ridiculous acts: pulling pints, given to any willing audience member, on repeat to the point of despairing hysterics; drawing portraits of audience members that end up being a cow; and shimmying, wide eyed, to slithering music in his flowing tiedye kaftan. I am immediately enamoured. So open and warm is this clown, responsive, and stupid, that we can’t help laughing out loud at his endeavours to essentially do nothing.

At some point a microphone emerges and Mawaan has to stand on a small stepladder to reach it. We finally hear his voice. There is a niggling part of me that feels slightly disappointed at this, perhaps because it returns the piece to a more traditional stand up comedy form, perhaps because I am so fond of the miscommunication and over-use of Mawaan’s expressive eyes that the silence creates. The disappointment doesn’t last long, though. Elaborately bad, nonsensical jokes and mad hat game shows are fired out. My personal favourite act of the ‘mergician’ sees our clown take two words from the audience ‘banana’ and ‘sandwich’ mergiced into a ‘bananwich’. Quite simply, I love this. Perhaps there is room for a return to more of the mimed silence, although I question if this is possible once the audience has discovered that the clown can speak, perhaps something to be explored, and I have faith in the unique ability of this performer to make anything possible.

There is a real renaissance of live clown as a form at the moment, and it’s intriguing to see this performance cross out from ‘new’ media into ‘old’ – working with a live audience being clown’s natural home. Stupid and ridiculous as it may seem, to do clown well takes real skill, openness and generosity. Only with a willingness to be a complete failure can it really succeed. And Mawaan succeeds with zeal: he gives space to his jokes, has the confidence to wait for a laugh and remains endearingly present and open throughout these 45 minutes of heartwarming silly joy. This is masterful and supremely hilarious stupidity delivered by a very clever clown.

Le Gateau Chocolat - Black

Le Gateau Chocolat: Black

Le Gateau Chocolat - BlackBlack. Black room, black bed, black lamps, black piano, black performer. The title of this piece reflects the strong and driving theme singer Le Gateau Chocolate (British-born but brought up in Nigeria) seeks to challenge: What does black mean? In descriptions of mental health. In the battle between good and evil, light and dark. And of course as a categorisation of skin colour.

We are invited into Le Gateau Chocolat’s bedroom; his private world, behind the make-up and the wigs, and gently lulled into a bedtime story of his childhood. This is beautifully visualised by Mark Chalton with a friendly animation of ‘Little Black’ – a boy growing up in Nigeria with dreams to be a famous opera singer, dressed in fine gowns and draped in jewels. This dream proceeds to be slowly torn down by society, school mates, and family, finally shattered by the piercing voice of Le Gateau as he laments this loss. The animation is interspersed with musical numbers from our tenor, a voice so powerful and emotive that an operatic rendition of Strange Fruit raises tears from more than just myself. As we see ‘Little Black’ grow into an adult, the story expands into issues of self image, body image, and sexuality and I am made acutely aware of Le Gateau’s ability to make himself vulnerable for us without making us uncomfortable, although this is difficult viewing. These are some of the categories he is defined by: an overweight, homosexual, cross-dressing, black man brought up in Africa. He brings such tenderness to the difficulties that he finds in social expectation and categorisation that the ridiculousness of these structures is laid bare with numbing strength. Digitally projected tips on how to deal with being fat; a song composed from advice given on the NHS direct hotline; and mimed moments of Whitney Houston portray his sense of the frivolity of human existence in stark contrast with the weighty darkness he has experienced in periods where he has found its fragility almost too much to bear.

There are so many big themes here, each one has enough potential for a whole show. Le Gateau has made his name performing cabaret numbers for the likes of La Clique and La Soiree, but here this endearing performer immerses us in his perspective on the world and I would have been happy to spend more time on every point.

Le Gateau never points fingers or hangs blame, he simply does the bravest and strongest thing anyone can, he allows us to look at him, vulnerable, alone, open and stripped of his stage persona. To look at him, listen to his story and sink into the reality of the world through his eyes. This is an important, relevant and invigorating piece of cabaret theatre, moreover, this is an important, relevant and invigorating man, and I for one am very glad that he exists. Long live Le Gateau.

64 Squares - Rhum and Clay - Photo by Amelia Jane Hankin

64 Squares: Rhum and Clay

64 Squares - Rhum and Clay - Photo by Amelia Jane HankinThere is a drummer at his drum kit, dim light, smoke, and three performers dressed in grubby wartime hotel worker uniforms. There’s a large square of canvas on a rolling scaffold at the back and an air of suspense, intent, and unease.

Stefan Zweig’s novel The Royal Game tells a tale of love, loss, solitary confinement, interrogation, and chess, ultimately leading to madness and the multiplication or splintering of its protagonist’s mind and person: the unease seems fitting. This adaptation sees the cast paint deft pictures of 1930s Europe with slick and masterful play of multi-roling, a sultry, live jazz percussion score, and many striking images and smart physical signatures that represent the fractured memory of a man driven mad.

We are whisked along with great energy and pace as our performers, all playing the divided protagonist, pull at submerged memories to try and string together a coherent story of how he has arrived here. In magical moments of object manipulation, boats are made out of chess boards tumbling through storms while the live score from the drummer summons the effect of sea sickness. We are shown the underbelly of a ship, with clever use of hand held torches and shadow to create the suffocating effect of dark tunnels and a heaving engine. We travel to hotel dances in Vienna, 1937, all crystal tumblers and smooth music, see our protagonist’s world begin to crumble into a snowstorm of weathered paper files in the moment his love is taken by the Gestapo. As disasters begin to engulf him, his memories begin to slip and repeat effectively as less and less defined images.

There is no doubt that this company has physical theatre skills in abundance: they shift perspective in a snap and their hands draw out scenography and objects with ease and precision. They have complicite and charm and this is a solid and intent telling of an engaging story. Yet perhaps in their attention to skill and detail they miss some of its heart and grit. Trained at L’ecole Lecoq, there is a signature style of emphatic and precise physicality with sparing and intelligent use of stagecraft that feels familiar to an audience now au fait with this physical theatre form. Perhaps I was looking for a development on this, a unique twist or something that made the story relevant to us today. The slick skill serves to impress but narrowly misses truly serving the story. A little more stillness and space for the deep human emotion that is present in the theme would open up a place where I could feel more moved. Nevertheless this is an impressive piece of theatre with excellent design, strong performance and evidence of a company who really know how to work well in an ensemble.

Flabbergast Theatre - Tatterdemalion

Flabbergast Theatre: Tatterdemalion

Flabbergast Theatre - TatterdemalionFlabbergast Theatre have grown a reputation for delivering highly skilled visual comedy. The creators of Boris and Sergey have etched out their own unique visual style in slick performances of high-energy tabletop puppetry. Tatterdemalion is their first foray into the world of clown and mime whilst still incorporating some object manipulation. Yet, in comparison to the confidence and verve of their puppetry work, their skill in this new form is very much in development.

Set seemingly nowhere, I am as confused by the opening as our solo clown performer seems to be. Entering in a nightgown and sleep hat with a teddy bear, only to discover an audience is waiting for him. From here on, the lack of clarity of the clown’s awareness and relationship to the audience creates numerous problems in delivery and communication that lead to bemusement and ultimately frustration on my part.

Theatre clown is an incredibly complex and enigmatic form, with its own very specific mechanisms and parameters. It warrants years and even decades of exploration as its meaning and ‘reason’ is aptly as intangible as the meaning of life. So, a series of questions here might suffice to express the areas I felt demanded further attention. What do the company define as ‘clown state’? We might describe it as a sort of living, breathing, vulnerability, and openness to an audience. Yet Tatterdemalion’s clown felt masked and remote (and lacked vulnerability). What is the clown’s status in relation to the audience? If high status, the audience may laugh at the clown’s idiocy in seeing themselves thus; low status and the audience may laugh at them whilst the clown desperately tries anything to please them. Yet this clown lacks definition in status, making for a vague and shifting relationship with the audience and I squirm to try and find humour in this awkward dynamic. Where is the clown’s pleasure? In pleasing the audience or pleasing themselves? Either can be intriguing and endearing but again neither seemed clear or evident here. What impulses does the clown follow? A clown can be said to only come to life in front of an audience, living an incredibly present and impulsive existence. This is part of their unique charge. Many events and actions take place throughout this piece: clothes are changed, objects are mimed, yet the impulse, reason or pleasure to do this isn’t made clear.

Redeeming moments are found in the glimpses that we get of object manipulation: the company’s strength in this realm is powerfully evident and a magical headless shirt that presides over a pop up shop is mesmerising to watch. Yet these moments are brief and lack any seated context, perhaps adding to the confusion.

Theatre clown is a mystical and baffling form that tackles the very reasons for performance and being and it is currently experiencing a certain renaissance thanks to the popularity of performers such as Dr. Brown. It’s valid and admirable for such a successful comic troupe to be drawn to the form, but at this stage the show feels more like dipping their toes rather than making a piece that really immerses itself in the questions and principles of clown.

Little Bulb - Antarctica - Photo Paul Blakemore

Little Bulb: Antarctica

 Little Bulb - Antarctica - Photo Paul Blakemore

“Ahoy!” calls the greeting from our Expedition Leader, Sir Peregrine Falcon, and we’re warmly welcomed into our journey to Antarctica. Gentle and jolly xylophones score our snowy space and we are quickly whipped aboard a small wooden boat to set sail to our destination, where we are hoping that we might catch sight of the evasive and majestic Owlerbear. Of course with an audience full of toddlers we are never asked to leave our seats, which is a relief for parents, although many little legs do make it onto the playing space several times, dealt with deftly by the charming cast of three. Instead, the company transport us on a visual journey to the snowy south.

With brilliant object manipulation and beautiful stage craft, the aesthetic of the whole piece is magical in its simplicity. Little Bulb stalwarts Clare Beresford and Dominic Conway are particularly marvellous at magically switching between playing tailcoated penguins and moustached seals, being musicians and puppeteers of various birds, fish, and whales, and contemporary-dance-inspired snow flakes, scattering white paper with exaggerated pliés. Little Bulb’s recognisable metatheatricality here provides some sniggers for the grown ups but the little ones find it equally hilarious. Their energy and joy in play is infectious and I am utterly won over by their depictions of animals and environments we encounter along the way. There is a particularly awe inspiring section of deep sea diving that uses clever lighting and a cascade of bubbles to create a spell binding image of a watery world with schools of fish and an enormous blue whale to boot.

The show is also educational and informative (penguins are, of course, Southern dwellers), with a clear affection for our great planet and a will to enthuse our young audience with the same delight and respect for it. However, I am never made to feel lectured or notice that we are of course visiting a place that is under threat of irreparable damage. The beautiful images and elusive mythical Owlerbear allow the audience to intrigue and marvel at this part of earth. Perhaps the Owlerbear is a metaphor for our vanishing landscapes, perhaps it is simply a mad cross between bear and owl, either way, the Owlerbear entices the audience to follow adventures and dreams with an ethical twist.

I am impressed at the ability to maintain a one hour show with an audience of babbling babies and chattering children, but rather than attempt to contain this, the performers engage and attend to it by bringing the audience on side with numerous call and responses from Sir Peregrine and specific roles given to some, slightly older, children in the audience. The room is filled with two to three year olds: there is a school group of reception aged children and a good spread of parents and friends. I didn’t have a tot to take, but the show was no less enjoyable for it as Little Bulb seem to have managed that magical thing; to make a show that is both brilliant for two to six year olds and very enjoyable for adults too. With beautiful design and great comic creation of characters, adults are able to identify with confused penguins learning the ropes of parenthood whilst children enjoy seeing grown up performers doing silly stuff. With lilting music and mesmerising imagery this a show that really does play on two levels.