Edinburgh Fringe 2024
Show Pony
By still hungry and Bryony Kimmings presented by Chamaeleon Berlin
Genre: Physical Theatre, Storytelling
Venue: Summerhall
Festival: Edinburgh Fringe
Low Down
A theatrical take on three circus performers and what their future holds. When they have worked hard all their lives to achieve their hopes and dreams, what’s next for them? Very well acted by all three performers who go deep – with impeccable timing and crafting.
Review
Created by still hungry and Bryony Kimmings and presented by Chamaeleon Berlin, Show Pony is about three performers Lena Ries, Anke van Engelshoven and Romy Seibt. They reflect on how their careers in the circus industry are seemingly over based on aging out of acceptable norms for circus skills performers.
Circus skills have moved into theatrical shows and are not bound by being presented in the traditional sawdust ring. However, it sounds like there is a real issue with this topic of growing older in this profession and the three performers from still hungry are being creative and taking a proactive approach.
Ries, van Engelshoven and Seibt stand before us in track suits and dance wear and strut around to jubilant music, each with a powerful presence. They are very good at what they do walking in lines and formations with perfect posture in different colour feather headdresses, then showing their individual circus specialisations, such as contortion, climbing the straps – and twirling while doing the splits on aerial ropes.
The show is structured in interesting sections with episodic titles projected on a large upstage screen. A microphone on a stand is the starting point for each section, when one of the performers announces the rules – and they all take part showing and telling what these rules really mean, and the claustrophobic affect they have on circus performers – and ultimately on each of these three performers.
We are told that these performers are in their forties and this is the bewitching hour for their careers when younger performers are sought out to replace them. However, from the skills they each perform they are very impressive with their expertise and it is difficult to see why they might not be rehired. This is why still hungry have done something very inspiring by creating this show. They are making original theatre and applying their formidable skills with their acting and storytelling skills to produce a fascinating delve into feminism, growing older in a young person’s circus performer’s world and stridently not accepting these labels!
One by one they share their own stories, background and how and why they were drawn to the circus and learning the skills to be able to perform in circus troupes. Ries, van Engelshoven and Seibt are sincere storytellers, effective actors when speaking their monologues that range from emotive, sad to humorous. Each story is different and moving in its own way.
For them the circus is or was everything to them and they reached high levels of skills in well known circus companies. Things are progressing in the circus world and multi skilled performers are sought out nowadays more than specialists in one skill. Other information about working in a circus environment or the perception of the public to individual acts is revealing and its not all pretty.
Video clips share some of the more difficult moments and fears in their lives poignantly. One of the last sections showing their older selves is amusing and imaginative but could benefit from editing to be shorter and still effective. Music selections during the show are engaging and complement the moments perfectly with sound design and original music by Tom Parkinson.
A theatrical take on three circus performers and what their future holds. When they have worked hard all their lives to achieve their hopes and dreams, what’s next for them? Very well acted by all three performers who go deep – with impeccable timing and crafting.
