An eclectic and heart warming UK premier show presented by Pink Fringe and The Basement. This charming and disarmingly clever young antipodean performer takes us on a no hole barred tender and hilarious confessional journey of the experience of being a queer romance-a-holic and how, even in a harsh and unforgiving world, hope can be as cheap as despair.
Mixing elements of stage and performance with deeper confessional stuff and some really quite sharp deconstruction (of being on stage) Drake managed to pull off that most difficult of shows, an hour-long dissection of his neuroses and romantic adventures. I’ve seen a lot of shows with that idea at the core, very few work. Most are self indulgent wank or angst fests but a few reach out across the ego and cheap laughs and touch the audience. When we laugh, we are open to suggestion and Drake wasted no time in making sure we were full of that.
The show combines….although combine is rather a small 2 dimensional word for all the various stagecrafts that were melded and quilted together in the unforgiving brickwork of the Basement. There was clowning, burlesque, acrobatics, multi media, recorded and projected bits, interactive, mime, restorative, audience participation, game show, surrealist, puppets the list goes on, most of it works and there’s just enough of each piece to keep the attention and the blends and segues worked well so the complexity of the show doesn’t get in the way of the flow. This show flowed so well, we drifted along his river of reflection and memory, riding the flood of laughter, rushing through the rapids of online dating hell, swirling in whirlpools of childhood angst,rounded the Cape of Loves Recovery, almost being dashed against the rocks of bitter despair, but each and every time with Sunny at the helm and also on the oars, in the water, on the radio, radar, in the seat next to us and on the shore, we arrived in a safe harbour of honesty, some of it almost too honest to bear. He was always so far out all his life, but not waving, nor drowning but frantically signalling to get out of the way as this showboat ain’t changing course for anyone.
Check out Drakes’ website here to see up and coming shows and some video from this one:
Drake is one of those rare provocative performers who are uber smart but ultra cosy at heart, wherever he took us he was in control even in those tender moments when it seemed he wasn’t. It’s hard to pull off sad reflective confessional and then rush headlong back into slapstick comedy but this evening I sat back and watched one of the most interesting and touching performances I’ve seen in a while. I learned something too, and I loathe learning when I’m out, unless it’s done with subtle talented panache.
It was a funny show, balanced well and Drakes’ run in with the Polygamy Police; a multi media Orwellian nightmare of searing dissection and crypto sexual political cant was very very funny indeed and will stay with me for a while. The show is technically proficient and its complexity is skilfully hidden under some clever sound and lighting cut-aways or dramatic changes of pace.
This is a show with a murmuration of subtle voices but one clear shout out: that although identity is a complex, fluid and astonishingly brilliant thing all of us want to be loved and life is just a stage we’re going though.
What a wonderfully baroque way to state the obvious Mr Drake. I’m a fan.
For more information about the Pink Fringe, CLICK HERE:
For more shows at the Basement, CLICK HERE:
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