London’s longest running theatre festival, the Mime Fest is currently communicating at venues across town with actions not words. There’s a whole week to go and you can find out what’s still in store on the festival website. Here’s what we thought of two festival shows we saw this week.
Tendre Suie by Toron Blues, Purcell Room
Inspired by Satre’s assertion that ‘hell is other people’, this short yet languorous piece centres around a length of thick rope, two bottles of fire water and a pile of finely sieved soil. Two women, mute except for heavy breath and yells, play out a cloying relationship via some slow moving but impressive aerial work. Their knotting and stretching bodies reveal they are both entangled and estranged. It’s odd and erotic, with at least two moments that made the audience audibly gasp. It plays in the Purcell Room on the Southbank until Sunday.
Plucked by Invisible Thread, Roundhouse Studio
Two tall bald, bug eyed puppets discover each other while foraging for worms. They have a series of unnerving and ill-fated offspring, after indulging themselves on a springy plank of wood. The relationship ends and the scorned puppet is predictably overcome with rage. Wrapped in black at the top of a tower, she takes out a series of suitors and locks them in a box. It’s a sinister, repetitive and winding story, populated by some impressively unpleasant characters that we ended up feeling quite unhappy to have spent an evening with.
See also our review of The Table at Soho Theatre
The Mime Fest runs until the 29th January. Find out more at www.mimefest.co.uk
