The Elephant in the Room

A Cluedo-tinged circus show: two bold-brushstroke glamorous genres with the potential for physical calamity. You can feel the tingle of brilliance in the concept. It’s only after the stylish credit sequence and the first bout of tumbling that the threads of coherence start to unravel in what is, nevertheless, a tremendously stunt-filled piece.

It’s the 1930s; we’re in a mansion and the four characters we’re introduced to at the start are embroiled in…I’m not sure what. There’s a poison plot and some love triangles that change direction quicker than a strobe light. But the hand balance, adagio and tumbling are stunning.

Tellingly, there is no credit for a writer here. Perhaps the cast got bored of the story they set up so deliciously at the start, but if so, why bother pretending to frame the show in narrative in the first place? In a way, it’s endearingly reassuring to see acrobats this talented making such a mince of storytelling – sort of like watching Alfred Hitchcock trying to do a backflip (who knows, maybe he could?). They are human after all. But it is also frustrating to see ideas and talent this humungous scuppered.

I keep changing my mind as to whether this matters overall. Bottom line: the show has some of the best acrobatics you’ll see at the Fringe, I promise. Up close, in a small tent – their Chinese pole finale is seriously unreal. But you do have to sit through quite a lot of weirdness in order to get to it.