MICF: The Boy with Tape on His Face

MICF
More Tape
The Boy With Tape On His Face
28 March 2014
The Forum, upstairs
to 20 April
comedyfestival.com.au

I know it's a brave call, but if you can only see one show at the Comedy Festival, make it More Tape from The Boy With Tape on His Face.

It's pure joy; like mainlining a rainbow.

It's the show you go to when you're feeling so down that kittens on the internet can't make you smile.

It's the show you go to on a date when you really like the person and really want the date to last long into the night and maybe forever.

It's the show you take someone to if it's been too long since they laughed.

It's the show you go to if you've seen a couple duds and need to be reminded just how brilliant the Comedy Festival can be.

It's the show you go to and want to be chosen for audience participation.

It's the show you go to because everyone who's seen it has told you to see it.

It's a guy, Sam Wills, with gaffer tape on his mouth so he can't or won't speak. He gets people from the audience and makes a stage full of absolute happy. It's clowning, magic and puppetry with a touch of genius and no description can do it justice.

It's also a brand new show if you saw him at MICF a few years ago.

This was on AussieTheatre.com

What I Loved: 2009

What I loved in 2009

Reviewers: you either love us a little bit too much or we’re ignorant, bitchy wannabes who wouldn’t know art if it bit us on the bum and left a nice pattern. (Which may be true.)

This year I’ve been told I’m too nice, I’m too nasty, I write too much and I don’t write enough. So a perfect review is not too much, not too little, not too sweet and not too bitter? Sounds kind of bland, Goldilocks.

Opinion is merely that, an opinion. I don’t know anyone who writes about theatre who doesn’t love it to their very core and I’ve yet to meet anyone who has the exact same taste as me.

So, please don't trust what mere reviewers or bloggers say – get out there and make up your own mind. Just keep seeing live art. See the stuff you’ve read about, the stuff you’ve never heard about, the shows people rave about and the ones they hate. You’re not going to like it all, and you’ll disagree with what other people think, but every once in a while you’ll be left breathless or in tears or laugh so much it hurts as you’ll wonder how these glorious artists knew exactly how you felt and put it on a stage.

These are some of the wonderful and totally awesome artists who blew me away this year.

Outstanding Artists 2009

WRITER
Jackie Smith for The Flood
and
Lally Katz for The Apocalypse Bear Trilogy
and
Sarah Collins and Justin Kennedy for Donna and Damo

PERORMANCE
Shirley Cattunar, Caroline Lee and Maude Davey in The Flood
and
Ash Flanders in I Love You Bro

EVERYTHING THEY DO ROCKS
Finucane & Smith for The Flood, Salon de Dance, The Feast Of Argentina Gina Catalina, and Burlesque Hour Legends.

Outstanding Productions 2009

CABARET
Dead Men Tell a Thousand Tales – Mikelangelo and The Black Sea Gentlemen
and
The Last Tuesday Society – Richard Higgins, Bron Battern and everyone else

MUSICAL
Avenue Q

COMMERCIAL SHOW
When the Rain Stops Falling – MTC and Brink Productions

DANCE
The Oracle - Malthouse Theatre and the Sydney Opera House

COMEDY
Goodbye Ruby Tuesday – Justin Hamilton and Hannah Norris

The Best of the Best

The Boy with Tape on his Face –  Sam Wills
and
Exit –  Ghostboy with Golden Virtues
and
Le Salon – Peeping Tom

My favourite of 2009

Floating - Hugh Hughs

The 2008 winners.

This also appeared on AussieTheatre.com.

The Boy With Tape On His Face

Melbourne International Comedy Festival 2009
The Boy With Tape On His Face
Mr and Mrs Wills
3 April 2009
Trades Hall

Despite its raving reviews, I never thought I’d be into a wordless work. Well, never shall I doubt a review again, as The Boy With Tape On His Face is the most exquisite piece of comedy theatre that I have seen.

The boy (Sam Wills) doesn’t speak. He can’t speak because he has tape on his face, and from this sightly disturbing, and never explained, premise springs delight and joy that defy description.

It’s like unwrapping a plainly wrapped pile of birthday presents to finding kittens, ducklings, the beloved teddy bear you lost at the park when you were six, an outfit that makes you look stunning, the simple answer to world poverty and a cure for cancer. And then your best friends, the family members you love and your resurrected childhood pets all run into the room to hug you and reveal a table laden with every type of cake imaginable.

The Boy With Tape On His Face is comedy that warms your soul and lets your heart beat in time with the rest of the audience. The audience integral to the performance, but please don’t let the fear of participation scare you away, as even the most hesitant participants were happy to be on stage.

We love witty wit, punny puns and cunning language play – but the artists we come back to are those who find the “voice” that is theirs alone and let us see the secrets they keep in their hearts. The touch of sadness in Wills makes the boy one of us, but he takes us by the hand and flies us into the glorious giant snow dome of his beautiful world.

You have been warned - if The Boy With Tape On His Face sells out, as it did at the Adelaide Fringe, you will miss something extraordinary and I defy anyone not to love it.

This review originally appeared on AussieTheatre.com.