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MOST POPULAR LINKS... FRONT PAGE... MONTHLY DRINKS NIGHT
Back in Town Again: - 'Waltzing Out of Town;
Verdict: Exceptionally sharp comedy
Back in Town Again: - 'Waltzing Out of Town; is 60 minutes of character comedy from Nick Mohammed.
It's an exceptionally sharp piece from a frankly brilliant performer. It's highly original, and uses the gifted stage skills of Nick Mohammed alone, and in sychonisation with a sound track that is in itself a work of art. A top show.
It's a set of mainly unlinked sketches. There is usually something disturbing and subverted afoot. He's David Rimrod, an increasingly manic weather forecaster with breaks into falsetto. He's a sleepy tv-watcher, reacting to increasingly alarming shows - David Attenborough watching a duck and bear mating. An air traffic controller guides planes while operating British Rail's enquiry switchboard, going on hold, playing the hold music Fur Elise on his keyboard. It's intellectual comedy, fast, perceptive and lateral.
He's Sue, a Home Cooking tv show chef with a recipe from Seville - 'Buenos Appertite'. It's abstract, and random with superb sound-effects. There are yams, dead sheep, murdered dogs. He's a dancer in a bar. He's a man at a keyboard trying to write to Sarah; the computer help becomes vocal, and guides him through syntax, and the right level of romantic interest.
A novice sports commentator in baseball cap, lots of badges round his neck, gives a stream-of-conciousness analysis of the sporting and domestic problems of athlete Linda, full of vitriolic digressions. David Attenborough (or David Bellamy) in the Borneo jungle discovers small cats. A wedding photographer groups people on the basis of their interest in pigeons, and offers to airbrush in the dead mother of the bride.
A deranged Safety Officer with autistic traits and an inner cauldron of suppressed rage gives a lecture on safety, borrowing from a book of jokes the character doesn't understand. It's a funny characterisation, but is the one sketch that goes on much too long. An NHS switchboard operator ploughs through questions, oblivious to the caller taking the piss.
This is a show that knows how to finish. A spectacular sketch of a conductor putting together a performance is the show's highlight - brilliant. With raised baton accidentally causing a segment of the orchestra to play, and a range of sounds from screams, noises from the pit of hell, jazz to swing, classical to sheep, it's an skilful blend of split-second performer timing and a remarkably imaginative and cunningly-designed sound-track. Astonishing.
Credits: Written and performed by Nick Mohammed. Directed by Zack Simons and Jonny Sweet. Technical Director John Linford. Publicity Designer - Vanessa Whyte. Company - Jonny Grommetts Productions.
END
John Park
reviewed Tuesday 9 August 05 / Underbelly
Fringe Report (c) Fringe Report 2002-2010
