Barry Castagnola’s new show revolves around the man himself running late for his performance in Edinburgh. He uses a projector on stage to show himself getting into all sorts of difficult situations on the way to his gig while the venue try to get him there quickly. The scenarios that he was in, however, were difficult to easily escape from and he came up with last minute ways of keeping the audience sweet.
Thanks to Castagnola's contacts we were presented with an array of misfortunate personalities, all impersonated by Castagnola to take to the stage to keep the audience entertained. First of the characters was the nervous brummie roadie whose talent for songwriting was shoddier than he would like it to be; due to Castagnola’s absence he had the opportunity to test out his material which contained awful but funny lyrics.
Next up was the comedian Donny Donkins whose dated name reflected his dated style. As Castagnola's lateness continued he was forced to employ his manager to take the stage. Unfortunately the manager’s ego had been inflated by mixing with z-list celebrities. Finally, the audience were fortunate to be graced by the Camford players, a disjointed Oxbridge drama society that tried to make up for Castagnola’s absence.
Castagnola is convincing in his various disguises and shows innovative use of character comedy. One moment of brilliance came during his impersonation of a Camford player; Castagnola represented the leader of the failing drama society leader, surviving off the funds of his father’s arms company with biting satire. His father’s company had printed their sponsorship on their acting uniform.
Overall, the show was entertaining piece of satirical character comedy but is not the most memorable of performances. It failed to propel the audience into guffaws, but was nevertheless was an imaginative and well rehearsed comedy.
