Imagine if David Starkey did a Fringe show. With Gary Lineker. And masks.I know, rightUnfortunately that’s exactly what this performance is like. It’s all about Arthur, the man, the king, the legend. It’s about what he was, what he is remembered as. It’s an interesting idea - Arthur presented as a sports broadcast via mask-people.Except that these masks don’t get worn. They sit there like mannequins, and this one-man show includes the performer speaking to them. And stroking them, and spinning them and altogether not wearing them. It reminded me of the fairly creepy hundreds of Venetian-style masks my mum used to collect and hang on a wall of our house, except these masks are beastly big, and altogether frightening.This performance can be very patronising - telling us things as if we are children, breaking it into bite-size chunks in a way that makes it feel that if we were given all the facts in one go, we might not understand it. The positive is that our performer is really passionate, really he is, but he’s the only one.So how does Arthurian legend translate to sports broadcasting? Well it doesn’t, entirely, but medieval battles took place on fields, right? And football, rugby, cricket... they happen on fields too. Right. Insightful.About halfway through the performance, as the stage is evacuated, and me being the only one in the audience, I burst into rapturous applause - it was over, and sooner than expected too. Fantastic! Except. Wait. My relief passes. This isn’t over, there’s twenty minutes left. ‘So ends the tale of Arthur,’ I’m told, ‘but the legend lives on’. And then he starts to sing.Maybe I missed something at this performance, but unfortunately it comes across as a poor attempt to combine two passions with a love for masks and throw everything together in a show. Probably best these passions are kept closeted for now. Or forever, in fact.
