Devised by: Jordan & Skinner with the company

Director: Caitlin Skinner

Justice for Lizzie Magie! So sounds out the rallying cry that heralds the start of Jordan and Skinner’s Do Not Pass Go. However, what could have been a long-deserved celebration of the woman who invented the game that would conquer the World, Monopoly, is a poorly executed, ill thought out, theatrical mish mash that fails to honour its heroine.

Successfully utilising Jordan and Skinners signature mix of: “physical theatre, clown, movement, politics and visual metaphor” requires a clever juggling of all of these elements and a competent cast of performers, skilled in all of these areas. In creating the work with the entire company, it appears that every voice has been listened to and acted upon with no overall thought to the quality of the final piece. The physical elements are unconvincing and over long, the visual metaphors unclear and the movement sequences clumsy and awkward. Actors speak over each other then break to explain, by speaking in badly synchronised unison, the timing just off enough to be thoroughly annoying.

Magie’s story is fascinating, how her idea of a game advocating the Single Tax System , created as a means to highlight the dangers of a world where those who own the land rule the world, became a world-wide celebration of greed and Capitalism is fascinating. But you would be better served by Googling rather than relying on any enlightenment here.

What could have been a quirky, informative and hugely entertaining biography of an underserved woman ends up presenting like the worst example of an indulgent drama class exercise where everyone is slapping each others back at their cleverness in finding Magie’s story. To its credit though, the performance does fully integrates BSL. This is an unforgivable opportunity missed.

Continues to tour | Image: Brian Hartley