Reviews

The Alchemystorium

I must own up. Gomito Theatre may have been coming to Edinburgh for ten years and garnering laurels in that time, but this is the first time I’ve seen them. I feel slightly as if I’m crashing the party.

My problem is, having missed the journey that’s led them to this point, and based on their latest offering The Alchemystorium, I don’t get what the fuss is about. I get the charm and the playfulness. I get the passion. I get the story. I get the relationship with the audience.

What I don’t get is this: why have the company decided to invade the territory of the mime artist and present some highly traditional naïve mime artist shtick, when the performers clearly aren’t trained mimes?

It takes long hard years to perfect the skills needed to present some of the stuff on offer in this beautifully conceived show. No amount of passion can take the place of professional skill and training. You’re left with an impression of cut-price artistry, Marcel Marceau on the cheap.

And then there’s the music. It’s fantastic and there’s no denying the playfully post-modern sense of irony that’s gone into choosing it. The trouble is that there’s so much of it you start to feel it’s doing some of the work the artists should be doing but aren’t equipped for.

I feel like an awful Jonah. But these hugely committed and engaging performers clearly have so much passion and talent. Why expose them in this way?

– Craig Singer