Reviews

Meg Clarke doesn’t have to worry about social distancing in this performance. She’s the only one on the stage – for over 80 minutes. It’s a difficult script, word and emotion heavy, in which her character, Effie, talks the audience through a time she wants them to understand - acutely. Skilfully she draws them into her story, making them laugh at times, shocking them at others, seeking their empathy, but never letting them get too close. There’s a reason she’s got them together and she’ll draw them in until she’s ready to tell them why!

Puffs, presented by Act, Belong Commit and Art in Motion Theatre Company (AIM) is the story of “Seven increasingly eventful years at a certain school of magic and magic”. An unauthorised satire, tribute and love-letter to the Harry Potter series, it is set in a school house called “Puffs” and the characters all bear names remarkably similar to characters mentioned in obscure parts of the Potter-verse.

In this unique adaptation Odysseus is an old man living in Ithaca who spends his time singing and telling stories. Among his tales are the Trojan war, the Cyclops, the underworld, Circe, the suitors, and Penelope. The performance treats the audience as people who gather at his house to listen to him reminisce about his adventures. This gives the show a perfect structure and rationale and, combined with a cavernous setting and simple costuming, gives the show a very authentic feel.

Eliane Morel – as ‘Madame d’Aulnoy’ with verray Fronch accent – invites us into her 19th century Parisian salon for a subversive take on some well-known – or well-worn – fairy tales.  This is no Freudian Bruno Bettelheim interpretation of hidden meanings.  Rather, in monologue, song and image, Disenchanted is a retelling of the tales from the point of view of the supporting cast – with a decidedly feminist slant.