Alan Bissett: The Red Hourglass @ The National Library of Scotland

★★★★★

Review by Stephanie Green | 18 Aug 2012

Published in The Skinny Magazine

Long awaited, after the smash-hit success of The Moira Monologues, Alan Bissett's new drama, is an equally hilarious series of monologues all played by Bissett himself, but this time with a political edge. We are in the creepy, Gothic world of spiders kept in a scientist's tank. What terrible experiment are they there for?

This is fear with a satirical edge as Bissett marvellously embodies his characters, with an impressive mimicry of accents. First, hunched in a black hoodie, he plays the common spider, or the house spider as he prefers to be known, the smallest and the most Scottish, so feeling kinda inferior. Then he is a recluse spider from Brooklyn feeling claustrophobic, who longs to return to his small family, only 31,000 kids so far; a tarantula with plenty of latin machismo; and lastly, but most deadly, the Black Widow Spider (whose markings give the play its name), the 'psycho' who Alan plays with a seductive Deep Southern lisp like Blanche du Bois.

Bisset's cleverest role is the tank (prison?) counsellor whose jargon is sent up, only seemingly caring, indicating the more serious undercurrent in the play, a critique of them and us. Who is the victim and who is the predator?

National Library of Scotland, George IV Bridge, EH1 1EW 15-16 August and 18-25 Aug at 7pm (1 hour) Age 16+ Tickets £12 (£10) via The Fringe Box Office Tel 0131-226-0000 www.edfringe.com http://www.alanbissett.com

I am Son – Sanpapié

I am Son – Sanpapié @ Dance Base

Are we westerners?

★★★

Review by Stephanie Green | 18 Aug 2012

Published in the Skinny Magazine.

An existential quest, this is an ambitious piece exploring the contemporary emptiness of Western/European society in its post-war context, but sometimes less is more.

Although there are fine moments of choreography by Lara Guidetti and the white costumes and props are sometimes visually stunning, this surreal montage of fragments, informed by the post-modern 'poetics' of Heiner Müller, has far too many props: masks, tailors' dummies, red noses, hearts/balloons, a flag, projected text and too many themes: consumerism, the '68 revolution, pornography, the red noses suggesting the commedia dell'arte, national identity (whether Italian, or European or Western), so that what potentially could be a strong piece is overloaded.

This work grows out of its avant garde influences from Bob Wilson and Pina Bausch's Tanztheatr to Matthias Langhoff. But these influences saturate I am Son rather than being transformed into something more authentic. The section where Lara Guidetti alternates between moments of a Christ-like crucifixion and being beaten, to knowing smiles at the audience is chilling and effective, making the audience complicit, but the onanistic sequence is so repetitive it becomes tedious. This uneven quality shows that with a more rigorous, focused approach, this choreographer could achieve something powerful.

16-25 Aug (not 20) Times vary. Tickets £10 (£8) Running time 45 mins Dance Base, 14-16, Grassmarket EH1 2JU Booking 0131 225 5525 www.dancebase.co.uk http://www.dancebase.co.uk