Speed: The Movie, The Play

In the car park behind the Prahan Town Hall sits a big passenger bus; people are queueing up eager to jump on this theatrical joyride. Speed: The Movie, The Play, devised by the Brisbane based comedy theatre company Act React - they specialise in pop culture inspired performances and immersive theatre. Touring nationally across Australia, offering audiences a hard arse hour of unstoppable entertainment, they have now returned to Melbourne Fringe.

Most of us would be familiar with the acclaimed best action/thriller film ever made in the nineties, Speed (Jan de Bont,1994), starring Hollywood legend Dennis Hooper with budding stars Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock. A bomb, a crazy ex-cop, SWAT team and a sweet pretty lady who takes the reins in one ‘helluva’ ride across the multi-lane highways through and around the city of Los Angeles.

The ensemble actor/comedians round up their forty passengers and play havoc in a (makeshift) lift just like in the movie. In this three-course theatrical feast, we have just smashed out the entrée, and drooling for the main, we hop, ushered into the big bus, for the real fun and games.

The show is a hoot - cheesy one liners (direct quotes from the movie) along with the impromptu audience participation. Modern vaudevillian comedy with cheap special effects includes inflatable palm trees, signage, an overhead projector simulating the LA landscape - evolving around the bus. The final act in this wicked play was more than just Keanu getting his just deserts with the evil ex-cop. No spoiler alerts!

Written and directed by a bunch of hugely talented performers - Dan Beeston, Natalie Bochevski and Gregory Rowbotham - they also have series of other movie/play shows including Titanic and Die Hard attached to their peculiar oeuvre.

 This show is a real winner, offering a busload of entertainment, with audiences literally rollicking with unstoppable laughter.

If there is one show that should not be missed this year at Fringe, it is this one.

Flora Georgiou