Edinburgh Fringe 2024
Worm Teeth
SMaK Productions
Genre: Interactive, New Writing
Venue: Paradise in the Vault
Festival: Edinburgh Fringe
Low Down
This is a piece of theatre that really grows on you, provided you’re prepared to engage warp factor six of your wilful suspension of disbelief gene. Using the eponymous Worm as narrator, it explores themes including identity, morality, and self-improvement using a variety of forest characters, a dipsomaniac of a dentist and some improv music. Plus a few very interesting sets of false teeth.
Review
One of the beauties of the Fringe is that you can be reviewing the academic and erudite one minute and the next you’re pitched into something that’s right up there on the absurd / surrealist / downright plain bonkers spectrum. Worm Teeth, which turned out to be an engaging, queer interactive piece of new theatre exploring themes including identity, morality, and self-improvement, falls most definitely into the latter category, and for all the right reasons.
Our eponymous character is quite happy in their own skin, yet feels that something is missing – teeth. And this is interactive theatre in the tight setting that is the Paradise Vault, so we, the audience, are immediately inveigled into helping Worm find a set of said gnashers, along with a number of its eclectic friends.
So begins an enchanting journey through the forest as Worm searches for that set of bones they feel will make their life complete, assisted by an adenoidal Frog, a Marilyn Monroesque Fox and a dipsomaniac Tooth Fairy just interested in making a buck. Oh, and a moralistic dentist warning all and sundry of the dangers of possessing molars, of any kind. You see – I told you it was truly, downright bonkers.
This is a piece of theatre that really grows on you, always providing you’re prepared to engage warp factor six of your wilful suspension of disbelief gene. Kelsey Sullivan’s writing is alternately wacky, then philosophical before flipping back to plain bonkers, all the while subtly prodding you about its central themes of identity, morality, and self-improvement.
The acting is sublime, with Alexandra Hess superb in her portrayal of the wriggly thing central to the plot. Grabbing and holding audience attention is critical to the success of this show and Hess has us eating out of her hand (not literally, one should add) moments after she wriggles on stage. Vocal projection is crisp and movement is tightly defined, making for an exquisite characterisation.
Supporting Hess is Sango Tajima as the dentist. And what a dentist. The only one I’ve ever heard declare that teeth are bad for anyone. Teeth were only invented, apparently, to make dentists rich by causing you pain. She’s got a point there, I’ll remember that next time I’m due for a check up. But this particular dentist’s evangelical zeal to practice what she preaches leads to a surprising outcome.
Abrah Ophelia Katzman plays all of Worm’s friends. Come on, come on, the adenoidal Frog, a Marilyn Monroesque Fox and a dipsomaniac Tooth Fairy. Do try and keep up! This was the real acting challenge in the piece, one that Katzman pulls off with impressive zeal. It’s technically challenging for the actor in terms of characterisation, accent and physicality as well as a logistical nightmare with the costume changing involved. Hat’s off, then, to their bravura performance.
Aurora Behlke smooths the frequent scene changes and augments the on stage action with cleverly improvised music, using an accordion combined with a series of percussive instruments. However, she only has two hands, so had to rope in an unsuspecting audience member at one point, another of this production’s little details that added genuine warmth to the overall experience.
And that’s what grabbed me about this piece. It took a while for me to realise it after we’d all dispersed into the evening but the whole thing radiated warmth and inclusivity, from the way I was welcomed at the venue, shown to the auditorium, brought into the show by the actors engagement with their audience and then thanked by the production team as I left.
This is a very good show. Yes, this was an interesting piece of new writing. Yes, it was well delivered. Yes, I appreciated the points it wanted to get across. But it was also about creating a fun environment for everyone in the room, no matter what their background, interest in the performing arts or whether they were even interested at all. The actors just wanted you to feel a part of it. And I did.
But did Worm get its teeth? Maybe you should go along and find out.
