Observations of human behaviour from the perspective of a dog: it’s honestly not as bad as it sounds – but not by much. The single performer, Korina Kontaxaki, is an expressive and engaging actor, sustaining the audience’s attention throughout the forty-five minute performance, aptly identifying and mimicking the characteristics and mannerisms of a dog.
I suppose the dog was chosen as a creature that could comment on the peculiarities and absurdities of human behaviour both from an outside perspective and yet a position of close proximity. There were a number of interesting moments when aspects of human behaviour and society that would appear bizarre to an alien race were innocently commented on by Lulu: the cultural importance we place on money; big breasts; fashion (described by Lulu as the importance of having a ‘special kind of material to wrap around your legs’). Yet none of the observations scorched with originality or profundity. The production succeeded neither in being particularly moving nor particularly humorous, as most jokes fell like lead balloons, attracting only a polite titter from the audience.
The fault lies with the premise and perhaps the writing. The dog’s characterisation was hard to fathom - most times it simply appeared as a particularly dim-witted child. Too often it was fascinated with aspects of human behaviour that aren’t really that fascinating, or even that peculiarly human, such as Lulu’s male owner’s relationship to a ‘female human’ for example.
Overall it was an interesting effort, but ultimately a slightly awkward and at times vaguely boring performance. A production with a premise like this was always going to struggle to be taken seriously.
