This is a modern clown show - stunningly theatrical. Slava Polunin, who has developed an international reputation for his clowning, presents his show exploring comedy and movement while taking the audience back to the wonder of childhood. Winner, 1998 Olivier Award for Best Entertainment.
Having sat through many mediocre children’s productions over the years, I was not looking forward to this one. Many of them have consisted of cast members shouting in a patronising fashion, coaxing kids to clap when they would rather examine the contents of their sweet bags. This show therefore could surprise you.
Slava Polunin's ambition has always been to re-establish the tradition of clowning to a wide audience. Instead of relying on pratfalls and fast paced tomfoolery, he loves the poetry and insanity of the clown act. Sounds like a tall order but from the opening of Slava's Snowshow you are aware this is like nothing you have seen before. Smoke fills the stage and the clowns emerge like something out of 2001: A Space Odyssey, majestic, yet almost alien. Slowly but surely the audience warm to these shy characters and then the slapstick that you are used to appears.
This is a very interactive show as all the elements - including rain and snow - land at your feet if you are sat in the first few rows of the stalls. The younger members of the audience at the matinee I attended loved these involving parts of the piece. You may feel left out if you are sat high up, although Clowns do appear there so not to leave anyone too excluded.
Slava's Snowshow is not without its faults though. The first half is quite slow and the erratic sketches leave you scratching your head. Much of the humour in this act is too dark for little ones. But act two really brings events to life. One scene involving a sticky spider's web leaves the audience feeling entangled within the narrative, literally!
The finale featuring a snowstorm is absolutely beautiful. Audience members smile from ear to ear as this section leaves even the most ardent arm folder involved on every level.
As if that isn’t enough, the theatre resembles a giant playground in the last few minutes which leaves grown ups and children alike on their feet joining in. I won’t ruin the surprise – but let’s just say huge toys are used here.
Revel in the innocence and beauty on display and Slava’s quirky, original snow show will leave you feeling uplifted as opposed to cold.
If you also wince when you hear “clowns” or “children’s entertainment” mentioned in connection with Slava’s Snowshow, don’t be put off by visions of custard pies flying through the air or hordes of screeching kids. These clowns wear their conventional funny hats, mournful eyes and talk mainly with their offbeat props, but the traditional buffoonery ends there. This Snowshow is a quirky surreal slice of fantasy that should be kept in a snowglobe for later generations to admire. Enfolding the audience in a cloud of tickertape, dry ice, and snowstorms, you are swept up in a cloud of poetic foolishness and sweetnatured slapstick as the clowns create sketches of a child’s fantasy world. They turn their bed into a sailing ship, answer gigantic phones, tease each other, roll gigantic snowballs along the stage, shovel silver glitter on the front row, and clamber out on to the stalls’ seats, getting the audience to help them wander nimbly from headrest to headrest. The show, originally from Russia, has now been seen by more than 2.5 million in over 30 countries, and will do even better if it can manage to overcome some slight flaws. The pace drags a little in the first act, and there is a fair amount of guesswork involved as to what is going on. Watch for the tiny balloon gag and loveletter sketch. It may get a bit boisterous and frolicsome with some of the gags, such as the massive woolen web flung over the audience may make you feel like Bilbo Baggins warding off gigantic spiders, fun though it is. However, the finale makes up for all its faults, ending the show on a high note - a cross between a kids’ version of a Scissor Sisters’ concert, a crazy PE lesson, and a great party no-one wants to leave. Nina Romain (reviewed at the New Wimbledon Theatre, London, 2007)
- Nina Romain
21 Sep 07
This is the 3rd time I've seen the Snow Show in the past few years and although the show in Woking last week retained much of the fun and beauty, if that was Slava heading up the Wednesday night performance I'm a teapot. This aside, I did sense something was missing - a number of scenes seemed to have been cut, affecting the fluidity and it ran at little over an hour. AND what's with the signing autographs from the stage at the end - no, no, no! (I'll still go and watch it again next time it's back in the country though) - 86.145.255.231)
12 Nov 06
have just seen inside my head, and it was Slava's Snow Show. I have been waiting to see this for twelve odd years, and missed it each time it came to London, but earlier this week I sat on the front row at the Lowry, two feet from the legend that is Slava, and I'm still picking out bits of snow from my clothing. An overwhelming experience, hysterically funny, moving, and so witty and spectacular. A gourmet feast for the senses, but how the hell to describe half a dozen clowns looking remarkably like puppets, doing extroardinary things, all building to a blizzard that left the theatre several inches deep in paper snow? This blizzard was set to Carmina Burana at full blast with the brightest back lighting. Add to this a torrent of bubbles, and half a dozen 15ft primary coloured balls bouncing round the auditorium, and several dozen huge balloons, and you have two thousand people in tears behaving like children on a sugar rush. The clowns stand there looking perplexed. They had a lovely attitude all night as they seemed permanently surprised at being in the world, and in awe of the most simplest things. It reminded me a bit of that great German animated film Balance, and certainly the long shabby overcoats looked similar. I'm a real sucker for this sort of physical theatre. Why should a clown opening a huge suitcase letting lose some white balloons reduce me to tears? All the similar shows I've seen in the last year, an Australian one with a bungeeing piano, and Aurelia's Oratorio had one performer playing two characters at once courtesy of another piece of clothing. Here it was Slava and a supposedly lovely girl. Well it was a coat and a hat. She slipped a love note into his pocket and seemingly arranged to meet at a station. No sign of her and Slava tore up the letter into a dozen pieces, which cued a trickle of paper snow over him, then over the audience, then more, and more and more, and then the back wall erupted into this blizzard. Fantastic. The snow poured down for fifteen minutes and the balls bounced around, and I sat with Slava at the side of the stage, and rather geekily had my photo taken with him, sort of chatting in broken english. A generous performer who looked surprised by the reception. This show has been round the world and back for the last thirteen years, and becomes one of those rites of passage significant shows one has to do at least once. But sit at the front!!!
What is it about snow on stage.......I could write a whole thesis about it as a dramatic element.
do look up pictures of Slava on the internet. Even better see the show itself. it's in the UK for the whole of November. Theatre cleaners must hate it.
www.slavasnowshow.co.uk - and do watch the video through to the end.
- 84.69.212.195)
29 Oct 06
The idea of clowns and mime...you'd have to drag me in kicking and screaming. Luckily for me, someone did. I hear Simon Callow says it's the most beautiful thing he's ever seen on stage. I absolutely lost my heart to it. Funny, emotional, above all purely joyful. Slava walks on stage and before he does a thing, you just know you want to go wherever he wants to take you. The man is a Master. He deals in delight. Go surrender! - 82.43.177.254)
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