Writer and Director: Kate Duhamel
CandyBomber Productions doesn’t suggest its new show Fray is aimed at younger audiences, but the tone and style of Kate Duhamel’s story feel as though it is. Arriving from America for its UK premiere, this is a hip hop story combining dance, narration and video graphics. There is a family-friendly approach to Fray that looks at themes including fitting in, finding friends and trusting your own reserves of strength to get you through the tough times as two brothers find their path.
Tullio and Ziya grow up watching a kid across the street playing a video game and jealously wish they could too. When they finally get their chance, the pair becomes obsessed with creating their own game and entering it into the Game Jam competition each year. But changing circumstances means they move around for a while with their mother until they find a place to settle, where the brothers also discover a hip hop dance crew that divides their energies.
Advertised as a 90-minute show but running for only 50, Fray is a hybrid piece that combines different storytelling devices including a voiceover narrator that splits the role of Tullio (who is also a separate physical performer), choreography by Sisco Gomez and John Graham, and the screen backdrop that includes animation and computer graphics that move the tale along, doubling for scenery as well as the interior of the game the brothers create. As a result, plot points are often repeated or re-emphasised in different forms which is why the show feels geared to a family audience maybe finding a way into hip hop for the first time.
As Akram Khan found with his recent adaptation of The Jungle Book, narration in a dance show can be clunky or cheesy and here the tone and placid but upbeat approach of the disembodied voice resembles a corporate video, the kind a pharmaceutical company might put on their website to summarise all the good they claim to do. In Fray, it is completely at odds with the street dance choreography of Gomez and Graham and the story of two school-age entrepreneurs working in their bedroom to create the next big video game.
And Duhamel’s show has very little plot to sustain its running time or doesn’t elaborate enough on the plot it has. The story jumps forward by twelve months on two occasions to get to the next Game Jam competition but doesn’t really cover the experience of Tullio and Ziya in between, while a brief digression into Ziya joining the wrong crowd and being physically attacked is passed over when their mother just moves them away. It means the audience has very little time to connect with the characters, to understand the things that drive them and why it is this combination of hip hop and video games that makes them who they are.
Gomez and Graham’s choreography is the show’s greatest asset, bringing the two lead performers Elijah Smith as Tullio and Jamai Robinson as Ziya together with an ensemble including Marie Spieldenner, Jost Karlin, Ken Nguye, Ola Papior and Molly Hincks who work fast on intricate numbers that combine synchronised group pieces with solo callouts that showcase their skills. As an introduction to dance hip hop, Fray has something to offer the family market like a graphic novel come to life and plenty of positive messaging about believing in your talent.
Runs until 26 July 2023
The Reviews Hub Score:
Geared to families
