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London International Mime Festival presents
Collectif Petit Travers in Le Parti Pris Des Choses
Purcell Room – Southbank Centre
24 January - 27 January 2008
A review By D.P. Phillips for EXTRA! EXTRA!
Collectif Petit Travers is a physically adept trio of highly skilled French circus performers who, together, manage to create a 50 minute visual spectacle which is highly energetic to the point of mania.
The stage is clean and clear, save for two chairs and a bucket. Each character we meet is an unsettling distortion of obsession and desire. Francois Labas’ character seems savant when spherical objects are near but fails where interpersonal relations are concerned. Nicolas Mathis shows us an obsessive compulsion toward controlling the space and the people on it. This leaves lots of room for acro-balance and eccentric dance. The troupe is completed by Celine Lapeyre who brings with her a wealth of skills including trapeze and tumbling. These three individuals work around or actively manipulate each other in a style that is reminiscent of childlike sexual exploration and playground politics descending, at times, into Cuckoo’s Nest weirdness.
During the performance, perhaps 300 silicon juggling balls are loosed onto the stage in a glorious ballet of bouncing …. It must be said that many of these objects left the stage … some, at quite a pace. In truth, the first of these flew, in a comical fashion, from the stage and hit a man in the front row full in the side of the head. I imagine he was less than pleased, even if the rest of the packed house, including a small girl of 5 years old and myself, found it positively hysterical.
All this notwithstanding, it has been said that the essence of comedy is based on balance and the loss of it. This may be the case but an entire show with no discernable narrative does leave me feeling a little short-changed.
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