The imagery of Sketch & Co.’s advertising summed up the spirit of the show perfectly; a classic sketch show in the tradition of the greats of English comedy. Sketches were generally based on events happening at various locales in a fictional village with a voice over introducing the scene. We saw a large number of wacky characters performed by the cast of three with a number of these characters recurring throughout the show.
The sketches themselves wore their influences on their sleeves. We saw clever word play along the lines of Pete and Dud as well as the surreal silliness of Monty Python. They were given a unique bent to make them their own and plenty of current references prevented them from being mere nostalgia pieces. There were a number of self referential pieces that operated on several levels to keep the audience on their toes. A particularly clever segment was the intermission and its warm up which brazenly sung the praises of the show we were watching as it provided some slapstick, ridiculed the show in an amusing musical number and ended in the most unexpected manner. Not every sketch was of the gut busting variety but you were kept laughing throughout.
Patrick White, Chris Maitland and Will Maitland handled the character work with ease. They threw themselves into the sketches with wacky accents, hammy acting, clever props and costuming of various complexity. Every scene required some significant clothing changes and stage setting so the show didn’t flow as well as it could have. They worked around this with a series of short recurring sketches in which only one actor was actually required on stage while the other shouted his lines from backstage.
An interesting aspect to the show was the inclusion of live musicians on the stage. Alex Gordon remained at stage right by a lamp, using his mandolin to provide the odd mood setting piece or short sting, even taking part in a bit of silly production humour. Occasionally he entertained the crowd while the others were setting up for the next sketch but for the most part we were left looking at a darkened stage.
Sketch & Co. was a quite hilarious and fun show. Lovers of sketch comedy will not be disappointed.
Visit the Fringe Website for booking details.