Twenty Million Thousand Leagues Under The Sea
Pummel Squad are a crowd favourite; people are queueing in droves to see their new fringe show. The experimental theatre collective formed in 2023 boasts absurd, wacky and eccentric mayhem. This is no ordinary theatrical performance; it is a show that stretches and leaps into new territory, offering curious new techniques to tell their story which includes clever popular culture references lucidly tied into the main narrative.
A used car salesman Mr Bulge is a family man having a mid -life crisis. A chance meeting after selling a rich Baron (who also so happens to be his doppelganger) a sportscar sees Mr Bulge coerced by the power and wealth of the Baron, inevitably finding himself twenty million thousand leagues under the sea (an uncanny reference to Jules Verne’s novel published in 1870). Following a series of startling adventures for Mr Bulge, he finally realises his normal life is really pretty good, after all.
An overhead projector is the quirky device that pushes the narrative along with the performers Harry McGee and Cooper Donald McDonald, who take the floor and take turns and join together- the story unfolds rapidly, with drawing, silhouettes, performance, song and dance routines including an hilarious rendition of Pet Sounds (Beach Boys album,1966), not to mention a clever weaving of the classic movie Casablanca (Michael Curtiz,1942) projected on to the back cloth.
McDonald and McGee flip the clear plastic sheets with drawings and cutouts. It can almost feel like a silent movie and or a shadow puppet show, but it is not, because it is more, and the show just keeps rolling on. They are superb performers, exciting and fun story tellers with all their quirks including their hilarious pompous eccentric accents.
Musician Yanto Shortis, on the side of the small make-shift stage, tinkers with his electronic sound hardware with blips, blinks, clunks and bangs - providing kooky wild ambient sounds and music, including a solo performance on stage strumming his banjo ukelele with homage to a cowboy-western movie.
The crowd are loving it, rollicking with laughter and squealing with joy. Pummel Squad are defiantly the new-it-thing and their new sell out show is a crazy shining diamond. Now with an extended season, this is more than just a must-see show.
Flora Georgiou
Subscribe to our E-Newsletter, buy our latest print edition or find a Performing Arts book at Book Nook.