Strawberry Sauce is a farcical darkly comic story about a man called Joe who is put on trial for shooting a girl with a plastic gun. Set in a surreal child’s play world with the aesthetics of a nursery, mystery surrounds what is real and what is not. Despite Joe’s protestations of innocence and the fact that the girl is unharmed, the corrupt police officials are determined to see him hang for murder. The one exception is Marissa, Joe’s fiancé, who also works for the police but believes wholeheartedly in his innocence. Their futile struggle against the police shows how, as Freshblood Theatre put it: ‘...reason is pointless in the face of lunacy.’
Whilst this seems an interesting premise at the start, the distinct lack of plot development leads to it becoming very repetitive by the end. We meet a host of manic characters, none of which aid the progression of the story. It has to be said that they succeed in creating a disorienting dreamlike world, and at times the audience seemed truly bewildered. Much of the script appeared to be merely set up for laughs, which sadly didn’t come. The performers carried on regardless and seemed to be enjoying themselves; this could have stimulated a more receptive audience, willing to participate in the drinking game during the show. The drinking game, although original, was a bad decision given that they play was on at two thirty. It was, however, a clear indication of the production’s inclination towards mindless fun over any sort of theatrical artistic merit.
The performance was certainly a totally bizarre and baffling experience but impossible to hate due to the sheer enjoyment of the performers. With a suitable audience in the right frame of mind this could be huge amounts of fun, but with an unpredictable Fringe turnout where you never know what to expect it felt a little miscalculated.
