Ten years of making what they describe themselves as “semi-epic, genre-bending performance that sits somewhere in between live art, music, theatre, comedy and dance”, Figs in Wigs are feeling a bit weary, a feeling mostly brought on by the slow and painful death of UK theatre. Of course, theatre isn’t dying – performers will perform against all the odds – but relying on it as a career is getting more and more precarious. Making theatre, say the company, is like being the string orchestra on the slowly submerging deck of the Titanic.
Big Finish is about endings – the end of UK culture as we know it, (possibly) the end of Figs in Wigs, the end of the world. It’s a riot of the poignant and the ridiculous, a sardonic salute to the apocalypse.
The aesthetic of Big Finish is ridiculously over the top. Shunning the stripped back, DIY nature that this kind of show all too often embraces (for visual design and/or economic reasons), Figs in Wigs and Designer Naomi Kuyck-Cohen don’t hold back, filling the performance space with sand, driving around it in a golf cart. There’s a money blowing machine, a smoke machine, a foam-making machine. There’s multiple costume changes, all of which reveal some cleverly conceived and fantastical garb – red puffer jackets and cycle helmets transform the company into dancing crabs, trouser-less dinner jackets are paired with wearable chair legs (who knew? Look them up!), red boilersuits and beekeeper veils make for a stunningly weird post-apocalyptic look.
The complex design and costume changes can slow the action down. Projected scene titles fill some of the empty space but there’s still a lull between some of them. A lot of the company’s efforts go into moving and building bits of set, some of which then seems rather underused. A tricky collapsible ‘last supper’ table looks especially challenging.
As the show draws to a close, local performance academic Wayne Jackson takes to the stage for a Q&A. It’s a witty and beautifully choreographed ten minutes of comedy from the company before they plunge back into chaotic craziness in a final, and hilarious, end of the world scene.
This is niche stuff – theatre for the initiated, theatre for theatre-makers, for lovers of the absurd. The HOME audience is full of them. There’s nods and knowing laughs. So is this a bad thing? It could be if there’s not enough of them buying tickets, but the sold-out audience would suggest that’s not the case. And not if the work has enough humour, tenderness and zeal to keep you entertained, and Big Finish has just enough of that.
Runs until 24 February 2024
The Reviews Hub Score
Chaotically crazy
