Image: supplied
The word ‘tatterdemalion’ means tattered or dilapidated, or more specifically, an individual in tattered or ragged clothes. Tatterdemalion carries the raggedness of its name but is imbued with an overwhelming charm. While it lacks a strong through-line and comprehensive structure, the show brims with the sort of genuine playfulness and originality that causes a whole audience to leave grinning despite themselves.
Henry Maynard is the is the artistic director of Flabbergast Theatre, who are also presenting an improvised cabaret show for adults called Boris & Sergey’s Vaudevillian Adventure at Fringe World. Tatterdemalion is his one-man show. It takes place in an octagonal venue the size of a bathhouse, with the audience seated in a small handful of semi-circular rows within easy arm’s reach of the show’s only performer. Maynard is a mime artist, a puppeteer and a clown and he ducks in and out of these forms throughout, binding his scattered collection of scenes together with a single, mysterious trunk of treasures.
Props are perhaps overused at times, with many pieces not particularly relevant, and this contributes to the show’s messy edges. When they are used well, however, it’s genius – the sort of manipulation of simple objects that makes the whole inanimate world seem merely asleep. In a striking change of tone from clowning to eerie puppetry, a shirt and hanger becomes a slow, silent receptionist. Later, the receptionist’s bell calls a boxing match between Maynard and an audience member. A baby is born, a bomb is suspected, and a man in the front row marries Maynard to a man in the second. Audience participation is immediate and persistent – at one point there are more people onstage than seated – but it is mercifully devoid of its usual terror. The tiny venue and the Maynard’s infectious warmth means that, rather isolating individuals from the safety of the crowd, everyone is implicated. It’s more audience inclusion than participation and the result is child’s play.
The show lacks polish, for certain. Even clumsiness in clowning requires precision and at some points of the show Maynard’s mime becomes rushed and incomprehensible. The lack of structure disarms some of the darker moments, leaving them without a home. The whole performance is conducted with such a sense of genuine, unsullied playfulness, however, that this hardly matters. There is a complete and refreshing lack of the pretence and arrogance that so often comes with performances such as this one; the attention-hungry trickster performance style is even gently scorned at one point. Maynard is not showing off in Tatterdemalion. He’s simply playing.
Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
Tatterdemalion
DeLux, The Pleasure Garden, Northbridge
Fringe World
Presented by Flabbergast Theatre
Performed by Henry Maynard
30 January – 6 February, 2015
