The
Scotsman
It's
inspiring to see a show that takes so many artistic
risks becoming a Fringe hit. The Idiot Colony, now
packing audiences into the King Dome, could easily
have fallen flat on its face; it's a testament to
the talent of all involved that it hasn't.
Take the opening – three women in white, individually lit, hair combed over their faces like the ghost from The Ring. It's a disturbing, arresting image. Moments later, Never Gonna Give You Up, Rick Astley's cheesy 1980s hit, begins to play.
It feels perverse at first, but turns out to be an ingenious, poignant choice. The show is about three women inexcusably locked away in an asylum in the 1940s, all victims of the patriarchal prejudices of the time. At first, the song simply tells us we are now in the 1980s; later, the bitter irony of these old, broken women, listening to a male singer blandly promising never to let his woman down, is
heartbreaking..
The show is full of such audacious tonal shifts. A flirtation in a cinema is played almost like a Benny Hill sketch, while other 1980s hits suddenly blare out incongruously. Yet somehow, all this enhances the mood rather than puncturing it, emphasising the absurd unreality of the women's lives.
They may not have been mad when they were locked away, the show tells us, but decades in an asylum have gradually broken them, to the point where, zombie-like, they are finally conforming. They have their hair done and hum along to pop music, while silently retreating into fantasies of a richer life they might have had.
In both style and theme, The Idiot Colony is a striking companion piece to the Gilded Balloon's sex traffic drama, In A Thousand Pieces, also about three abused, ignored women. It's a sadder, subtler show, more lament than lecture, but just as powerful. See both if you can.
By Andrew Eaton, 16th August 2008
Take the opening – three women in white, individually lit, hair combed over their faces like the ghost from The Ring. It's a disturbing, arresting image. Moments later, Never Gonna Give You Up, Rick Astley's cheesy 1980s hit, begins to play.
It feels perverse at first, but turns out to be an ingenious, poignant choice. The show is about three women inexcusably locked away in an asylum in the 1940s, all victims of the patriarchal prejudices of the time. At first, the song simply tells us we are now in the 1980s; later, the bitter irony of these old, broken women, listening to a male singer blandly promising never to let his woman down, is
heartbreaking..
The show is full of such audacious tonal shifts. A flirtation in a cinema is played almost like a Benny Hill sketch, while other 1980s hits suddenly blare out incongruously. Yet somehow, all this enhances the mood rather than puncturing it, emphasising the absurd unreality of the women's lives.
They may not have been mad when they were locked away, the show tells us, but decades in an asylum have gradually broken them, to the point where, zombie-like, they are finally conforming. They have their hair done and hum along to pop music, while silently retreating into fantasies of a richer life they might have had.
In both style and theme, The Idiot Colony is a striking companion piece to the Gilded Balloon's sex traffic drama, In A Thousand Pieces, also about three abused, ignored women. It's a sadder, subtler show, more lament than lecture, but just as powerful. See both if you can.
By Andrew Eaton, 16th August 2008