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This Was Your Life
Published on Tuesday, 16 July 2013
0

preview

Just the Tonic at The Caves (venue website)
Musicals
1-12, 14-25 Aug, 9:00pm-10:00pm

 Recommended for age 14+ only.

The cameras are rolling, the floor manager’s panicking and a nervous contestant is waiting off-stage. But this is no ordinary game show. In their sometimes-thoughtful, often-outrageous cabaret musical, Quite Nice Productions reprise the life of a recently-deceased young man… before we, the audience, are called on to decide whether to send him to Heaven or to Hell.

The best compliment we can pay This Was Your Life is to say that we’ve seen it twice: once at last year’s Buxton Fringe, when our reviewer praised the show’s bustling energy and ever-present wit, and again this May in Brighton.  The plot’s a simple one but it’s built around some very funny set-pieces, with the three cast members swapping rapidly between roles to deliver a series of surprising and creative twists.  But there’s a harder edge, too, with moments of chilling poignancy sometimes poking through the humour.

The characters are broadly-drawn, some of the jokes are bawdy, and it must be said that the musical numbers are often more entertaining than melodious.  But we can attest that the audiences in both Buxton and Brighton lapped up this show’s peculiarly compelling charm.  So if you like your Fringe youthful, and just a little bit silly… then perhaps, This Is Your Show.

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