Edward Gorey died in 2000, the author of 103 books filled with his dark Edward Lear-esque drawings. Hoipolloi have taken one of these stories as the inspiration for their latest lugubrious show. The play is set in a grand Edwardian house occupied by a grotesque household (somewhat akin to the Addams Family), played by the versatile and darkly-amusing company of five. The 80-minute play explores - in a highly entertaining fashion - the borderline between reality and illusion as the Doubtful Guest hilariously wreaks havoc by invading their privacy and wrecking their strict routines.
The family explain to the audience that they will play themselves as they retell the story of the visit from the Doubtful Guest. This aspect of the play has the jarring resonances of Pirandello's Six Characters in Search of an Author as the play jumps between the retold story and the characters' explanations. A further level of reality/illusion is explored by director Shôn Dale-Jones as the characters also outline several of the theatrical techniques they plan to use. These devices take a while to set up, but once the story gets underway, the audience of adults and young children at the Wolsey Theatre Ipswich (where I saw the performance) were thoroughly hooked.
Hoipolloi's trademark physical theatre style is to the fore as the company employ simple elements for each room of the house, grotesque facial expressions, puppetry and breath-taking set-pieces bringing to life the clever design by Stefanie Müller and highlighting the movement skills of the performers. The audience are kept on the edge of their seats throughout, with a final dramatic twist that sends everyone out with a twitching smile on their face.
Toured to UK theatres in March/April 2008 and Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh 2009.
In 2006, Hoipolloi was awarded a Total Theatre Award for their production of Floating, which “agitated the boundaries of theatre, creating worlds within worlds of illusion and delusion”. At the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in August 2007, Story of a Rabbit, their co-production with the New Wolsey Theatre, Ipswich was awarded a Fringe First from The Scotsman.
