With a strange, original and interesting production, Tomás Ford brings his Patrick Bateman of the Fringe to the Mash House to tell a one-man-musical tale of double crossing deceit, sex and torture. Using a enticingly chaotic mix of projection, recorded music and live vocals, Ford weaves for his audience a tapestry of soundscapes telling his story of a spy having a personal crisis and that getting out is just not that simple. But he really needs to
The music is massive and Ford’s performance is excellent, his vocal talents never waning during the hour-long-adventure
Billed as a multimedia rave cabaret, the one-man show is impressive in aesthetic but at points feels like the narrative is passed over for the benefit of indulging in the electrobeats of the performance. Opening the show with no introduction and launching into the first song, Ford detailing his brutal interrogation of a gang member, the audience are plunged head first into the hedonistic world of the spy chasing the notorious Sharktooth gang.
Using his audience as his landscape, Ford’s movement through the crowd during the piece provides for a new and different use of space in performance, employing the punters as tripods for a sniper rifle, spotlight controllers and adoring girls in the nightclubs of Singapore. By doing this, Ford brings us just a little more into his world, but does not do quite enough to let us forget the plastic chairs we’re sitting on.
The heights of excess and self-destruction reached by Ford as he speeds headfirst towards the show’s climax are intriguing but it does at points feel like a huge show trapped in the venue of a tiny one, with the effect of the expansive projections being understated in the small space. The music is massive and Ford’s performance is excellent, his vocal talents never waning during the hour-long-adventure, but I just wish everything could have been bigger, bolder and all-absorbing so that the audience can really get lost in his insane and incredibly woven world.
