Edinburgh Fringe 2024
It’s the Economy Stupid
Worklight Theatre
Genre: Comedy, New Writing, Theatre
Venue: Pleasance Dome
Festival: Edinburgh Fringe
Low Down
Fringe First Award winners Worklight Theatre return to the Edinburgh Fringe with It’s the Economy Stupid . This is a story of the impact of global forces on one everyday family, in the context of UK politics since the 1980s, and an attempt to teach the audience , with the help of a game of Monopoly, a thing or two about how money works (more akin to magic than maths it turns out).
Review
Once upon a time (1994) a small boy could buy a Beano for 40p and a 10p Chomp (small chocolate bar for younger members of the audience) with his weekly pocket money until he had an early lesson in inflation and his comic treat went up in price. Luckily his mum, a whizz at mental arithmetic and a corner shopkeeper, recognised that earnings needed to keep pace with inflation and the lad was awarded an extra 2p a week. Switching between micro money management by his family and the macro economics which impact on us all, Joe Sellman-Leava weaves a witty tale which genuinely helps explain how politics and the economy intertwine with an often disastrous impact on most of the population.
Sellman-Leava wears his politics on his sleeve, sarcastic, angry and sad in turn. But the show avoids being a monologuing rant because of his deft storytelling and his sidekick (and lighting designer) Dylan Howells whose deadpan delivery punctures the hot air balloon of righteous indignation. Howells is a dab hand at sleight of hand magic too, neatly demonstrating how apples can be changed to oranges and Adam Smith’s invisible hand theory of market regulation when a baguette pops out of thin air.
Standing in a set surrounded by brown cardboard boxes, at one moment the Berlin Wall, another the stock room of his childhood home and at times the screen for Howell’s delicate and evocative projections Sellman-Leava mixes impersonation (we meet Presidents Clinton and Reagan, Prime Ministers Major and Thatcher) and helpful metaphors to keep the audience entertained while illustrating complex theories. Directed by international director Katharina Reinthaller he is a naturally engaging performer and Howells needs a tad more volume and confidence in his verbal interjections to develop their double act. You will genuinely leave the show better informed – my notebook had more scribbles about key moments in political history than it did notes for this review – but also very entertained, if not a little bit angry about how the industry of the many ends up lining the pockets of the few.
