Seeing Michelle Brasier in KWANDA and Laura Frew in Fringe Wives Club's Glittergrass last week was a great way to whet my appetite for their new Melbourne
International Comedy Festival show, A
Very Fancy Dinner Party. As individuals they certainly have a strong engaging
stage presence but as Double Denim, their absurdist humour becomes unstoppable
and unpredictable, leaving audiences with no idea on what is going to happen next.
The very loose premise of A Very Fancy Dinner Party is that they – along with three other
couples – are competing on a reality TV cooking show, Eat My Shit, hosted by
Andrew G and James Mathison. Why Andrew G and James Mathison? Why not? Brasier and Frew play all the couples and the hosts,
as well as a few more guest characters, including a pair of crabs which they
seem to have most fun with.
Presented as part of the Melbourne Fringe Festival, The Human Project's 2.0
| Contact, is an exploration on what touch can be and mean to humans and how life
could be without it. A highly physical experimental piece, it incorporates
martial arts, dancing and some wrestling moments as an "outsider"
dissects and analyses the state of physical touching.
With injury befalling one of the performers, the show has had to be
restructured to work around the three remaining cast (Rosie Osmond, Ashton Sly
and Joseph Lai) and you wouldn't be able to tell as the performance is seamless
and feels like it has been just the three of them rehearsing all this time. This
is a highly demanding show - both physically and mentally - but the training and
effort the three have put in in getting this piece together is evident. With its
minimalist set, staging and costumes there is nothing for the
performers to hide behind and their every move and word is what has all of our
attention.
