The last time I saw The Umbilical Brothers perform live was on Wednesday 8th February 1995, when they played the Paisley Arts Centre.
Back then, their gimmick was to mime and provide sound effects to each other's actions. Now, they have returned with their new show, The Distraction, using the latest technology to add to the spectacle. As they put it, we don't have to use our imagination anymore.
 |
| Picture taken early on - the seats did get filled |
The preshow engaged the audience with light, silly on-screen jokes. Things like: "Funerals, not as fun as the word suggests" (I may be paraphrasing). It's a tried-and-true technique that elicits laughs and gets the audience attuned to the big screen.
David (the one with the hair) opened the show by talking to his reflection in the dressing room mirror, using ventriloquism to give his reflection a voice. Only there is no mirror. It's a projection using a green screen. David has a tablet set up so he can see and interact with the image. When the bit devolves into friskiness, Shane's reflection interrupts them, looking for Shane, who hasn't appeared yet.
We then follow the search for Shane as Shane's reflection dashes over the audience and out of the theatre into the street where he finds him and chases him back to us. What is actually happening is Shane mimes dashing about in front of the camera, while David runs about with a portable camera, with Shane's image superimposed on the view. Computer jiggery-pokery is engaged to show the second Shane in front of the reflection.
We move on to, in no particular order, audience's heads exploding; an improvised section where the pair superimpose their mouths over the relevant head section of an audience member who is still seated (so no one is safe - the guy behind me in Row F was picked) and improvise funny dialogue based on their expression, much as Nina Conti does with her masks; Baby Sports, where we see dolls participating in various sports, such as being used as bowling balls in 10-pin bowling.
It's wild. It's wacky. It's hilarious, and ever so clever. To make everything work, a tech brother on stage ensures the backgrounds map and the screen effects trigger at the appropriate time and place. Occasionally, he steps in to help with the physical effects, waving his legs in the air when Shane is supposed to be floating inside a space station.
After the show, they do a quick Q&A before returning to an old-school sketch, Man in the Bathroom, with David acting the scene and Shane providing all the sound effects. They close on a deleted scene: baby synchronised swimming, with a sick but funny payoff when one of the five babies drowns.
The humour reminded me of a cross between Looney Tunes and Monty Python. One cheesy line that made me smile was when mission control asked the redneck inside the space station who he was, and he replied, "My name is Whitney, Houston." Silly but funny.
They had merch, but I had no interest in any of it, especially a tote bag with a baby doll head on the front, even if, as they demonstrated, you could wear it over your head as a Halloween mask.
The outro music was Vitriol by Bluejuice, perfectly encapsulating the show's manic energy. The show didn't sell out, but local competition was strong, with the Gilded Balloon hosting a mixed bill at the Tron and Jon Richardson promoting his memoir at the Stand. Let's hope that doesn't put them off returning. I can't wait another thirty years to see what they do next.
(I realise this review hasn't done justice to the show's craft and invention; trust me, it's clever, funny, and well-deserving of its awards).
Ticket Price: £30.00 x 2 & Online Transaction Fee £1.50 & Booking Fee £7.20 & CH & OFM Restoration Fund £3.00 = Total £71.70 from Glasgow Life
Blurb
Live Nation presents:
The Umbilical Brothers: The Distraction
Winner - Best Comedy at the Adelaide Fringe Festival
Do you love staring at screens? Are you staring at a screen right now? You should get out more. Specifically, to a show that has an enormous screen smack-bang in the middle of it.
The Umbilicals take the energy of live performance and the spectacle of cinema and smashes them together into a new show performed simultaneously on stage and on the big screen. It’s like nothing you’ve ever seen, and nothing they’ve ever done, and it will blow your mind way more literally than you are expecting. The Distraction: enabling your screen addiction.
The Umbilical Brothers are an international comedy phenomenon. Their unique mix of mind-bending comedy and back-breaking physicality has taken the world’s favourite Australian comedy duo to 40 countries – from stadiums supporting Robin Williams to stadiums supporting N*Sync.
Named as two of Entertainment Weekly’s 100 Most Creative People in Entertainment, they have appeared on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, after James Brown at Woodstock ’99, and before Queen Elizabeth II. Their global gigs have included a year-long off-Broadway run where they received raves from The New York Times and a New York Drama Desk nomination. Awards include a Helpmann for Comedy Performance of the year, The Edinburgh Critics’ Choice Award and a couple of BAFTA’s. Younger fans and stoners know them from The Upside Down Show, which they created with Sesame Workshop and won them an Emmy and a Logie.
They haven’t just broken down the rules of theatre; they’ve invented a new theatrical multiverse. Unbelievable human performances meets special-effects wizardry. It feels so much like magic, you’ll want to burn them at the stake.
