saints and sinners of the stage and screen
saints and sinners of the stage and screen
Charming - A Farcical Fairy Tale
The Old Red Lion Theatre
10th December 2014
★★☆☆☆
Photography provided by What-A-Charming Theatre Company
At this time of year, what you really want is something light-hearted and jolly. Ross Howard's Charming - A Farcical Fairy Tale promises to be just that - it's roughly 90 minutes straight through of fairytale princes and would-be princesses. The Old Red Lion is usually a safe bet, and if I hadn't seen this show myself, I'd think whoever wrote this review had overindulged in the Christmas brandy. But sadly the venue has finally played host to an exception which proves its rule of excellent fringe theatre.
Princes Charming (Tox Oxenham), William (Alex Frisby), Rupert (Tom Everatt) and Simon (Alexander Stutt) are trying to bag themselves a bride, because they have a gentleman's agreement that the first to get hitched gets to be king. Rupert has his eye on Rapunzel (Zakiyah Rawat), Charming is hoping to find his Cloggy - umm, Cinderella (Gemma Harvey) - and William is hoping to wed Snow White (Antonia Draper), who may or may not be dead. They're not the only princes, but their brother the Beast (Matthew Winters) has no interest in game-playing and has disappeared to France.
As far as ideas go, there are certainly some intriguing ones there. Each prince has a clear back story, and playwright Ross Howard has all the elements for a good farce. However the opening scenes are weak, with references to Disney's 2D classic Beauty and the Beast, oral sex and closet jokes. And whilst threads are never forgotten, an attention to detail to be commended, nothing's really that funny.
Some of the gags fail to land. These include Charming perpetually getting his true love's name wrong - amongst others, Antony Mingella, Peter Sellers - a joke done much better and earlier in Book of Mormon. Another's a Rihanna reference and given Umbrella was first released in 2007, it's time to let go of the "ella" hook, even if it does actually work well with the character's name. The material isn't snappy enough to be a farce, and the delivery is similarly slow. In one of the last scenes, we see the entire ensemble zipping around the stage, in and out of doorways and it should have us clutching our sides but it feels like a strange out-of-body experience. It's as if you're looking at a scene from above, yet unable to react.
In the final third, it feels as if Howard forgets he's trying to write a farce and instead just writes - and while the material doesn't all fit into the genre, the quality is a lot higher. If the choice is between a badly written farce and well-written drama, well, I know what I'd go for each time. He can be knowing - "Oh, god, and now I can only talk in clumsy exposition" - but comedy doesn't seem to be his forte and highlighting flaws doesn't excuse them.
Photography provided by What-A-Charming Theatre Company
There are high points, though - Prince Simon is initially presented to us as a bit of a Simple Simon, and his personality is lost in the group interactions with his brothers. However, when we see him don a dress and pretend to be a Fairy Godmother, he makes us laugh. When he comforts both Cinderella and Rapunzel we see another side to his character, and out of all the princes - spoiler alert - this one's our hero after all.
Similarly, the heart-to-heart between Prince Charming and Cinderella brings out more depth to Charming, and we we reconsider the character. With a farce, you don't generally care much about the protagonists - they're figures of fun or simple vehicles to make the protagonists run about a lot rather than three-dimensional "real people". This change of pace doesn't fit with the genre, but these are the scenes which I enjoyed the most - again where Howard stopped trying to be funny and instead focussed on human relationships.
The puppetry too is cute, if underused. Winters dons a handheld head which is initially a little distracting but allows him to growl without any projection issues. The character of the butler (Felicity Wentzel) is even more neglected, but again, the puppetry is, well, charming. Something about this play does have to justify the adjective.
This isn't Charming's first outing - the production apparently had a run at the 2013 Camden Fringe - and it worries me that the show has been in development for so long and yet this is the result. A controversial suggestion, but I think this play might work better if Howard didn't try so hard to make it humorous and instead rewrote it as a drama which happens to have magical characters in it. A bit like Fables, not that Once Upon a Time rubbish. Not quite the magic I was hoping for and all the bibbidi-bobbidi-boos won't be able to help.
Charming - A Farcical Fairy Tale opened on 9th December 2014 and runs until 3rd January 2015 at the Old Red Lion Theatre.
Nearest tube station: Angel (Northern)