R.I.O.T-paniclab- The Place: 27.05.15

Playing from 7-31st August 2015 at Zoo Venues -Edinburgh

Last Wednesday I had the pleasure of dropping into The Place in King's Cross; a sturdy London venue that allows you to practise, watch and champion dance in many forms. This was true for the evenings performance, if you can include humans that morph into superheroes, that change into secret even more special versions of those superheroes, and then back to the original superheroes. Confusing much? Well that seemed to be the point of this pieces narrative; utter confusion and an inability to keep track of what's going on because, well, we all want to be the heroes of our own story right? The characters of this story certainly did, and it was being re-written and re-told over and over and over again...!

Starting from the top, the main character (known as CAP) delivers an 'origin story' where the audience learn about the loss of his closest friend and partner in crime 'Lucky.' CAP makes it his mission to seek justice on behalf of his friend and enlists the help of three other superheroes with different powers. Just as CAP goes on to try and deliver his 'I'm a strong American powerhouse who will save the woooooorlllld!' story the other actors start to break their roles to intervene with a query or costume quabble. This is where the humour was most definitely injected throughout, especially as the characters are often simply saying what you are thinking. Just as you had your 'suspend disbelief' hat on, it was whipped off your head and replaced with the 'break the comic book cliche' hat and then switched around in an instant.

Each character wilfully joined in with CAP's retelling of the story to a point, until it wasn't quite what they were hoping for their character's fate. This came in line with the political link, as the constant power struggle between heroes was put on show for all to see. Sound familiar?

The movement was highly impressive and boy were these guys strong. The piece was carefully choreographed and delivered by the performers themselves, which was clear to see as each performer made the best out of their skills and abilities and showed them off well.

Some choreography highlights were the 'Tango' section performed to 'El Tango de Roxanne'-Jose Feliciano, the ensemble performance to 'Slam' by Pendulum, and 'Sidekick's' carefully choreographed fight with a group of invisible villains. This was super creative and delivered highly on the illusion front. In fact it is so far my 'creative highlight of the year!' The 'Tokyo' video game reference was fun and nostalgic-enough to make me put a date in the diary to go to the arcade just so I can have a go on the old school games myself.

The graphics and animations which were projected throughout the production were a huge part of the show and added so much to the set, which was quite minimal. It gave it a filmic value which I think was necessary for this kind of show, and the visuals had an iconic element true to any comic book fans taste.

For something different this summer, do go and check this out in Edinburgh. If you're a dance fan, Marvel fan or comedy fan, the has a lot to offer and I promise you will leave smiling.

For more information visit:

http://paniclab.co.uk

or

http://www.zoofestival.co.uk

Photographs by Manuel Vason
with thanks to Anna Goodman at Abstrakt