Celia Pacquola in Hating Alison Bice has one of the funniest introductory video sequences I’ve seen in a long time (look out for the special cameo from a well known comedian). It sets up, well, the conceit of the show, which involves Celia Pacquola and Alison Bice being forced to perform a comedy festival show together in return for a sponsorship deal. Oh, and Celia hates Alison, and Alison hates Celia.
The publicity material for this show suggests a theatrical, theme based show which, in many ways, it is. The difficulty, however, is that it attempts to theatrically present the idea of itself. By that I mean that it is both the thing itself and the representation of the thing. And this is where it gets difficult for the audience.
The show is formatted into clear and distinct blocks; some with Celia and Alison breaking down the fourth wall as they taunt each other on stage or try to negotiate the situation with their tech assistant at the back of the theatre; some which is clearly theatre of theatre where a recurring sketch is a performance of a performance; and straight stand up sections as well as video sequences, in both of which the fourth wall is put firmly back into place.
The two use the contrast of their personalities well. Celia plays the more animated of the two and uses her expressive features to their best. As usual Celia shines when she’s at her most absurd. Whereas Alison is droll and caustic, dead panning her way through schtick which is unreasonably angry in a way in which only Alison can. There is also a construct of some big brother overlord dictating their circumstances and throughout the course of the show goes from a situation of purgatory to one of seemingly missed opportunity. The video (apart from the introductory piece) although amusing in moments could have been utilised better.
That said, there is still a lot of very good material here and the laughs are frequent. In a way though, the girls have sabotaged themselves with their own ambition. It’s hard for the audience to slip into a different mode for the stand up, making it difficult to appreciate the full worth of the material. The disjunctive nature of the show also seems to break the momentum down, hobbling the impetus of the thematic material.
Still, a substantial, original, ambitious show. Well worth a look.
Visit the comedy festival website for bookings and further details