Edinburgh Fringe 2022
Little Git
Ibic Productions / Paul Richards
Genre: Comedy, Musical Theatre
Venue: Paradise in Augustines - The Snug
Festival: Edinburgh Fringe
Low Down
Paul and Vikki are musicians heading towards the big 4-0. Over a series of short scenes, we see them celebrate their best nights ever, their concerns about not managing to get their careers to where their efforts should have led and the ultimate meaning of their career in the band. They are thrilled to welcome a cute little 8-year-old boy competition winner who gets to sing in front of their band, little knowing that he shall eclipse them. This leads them to be the cute little kid’s backing band – hence the little git of the title. But as they come closer and closer to the end of the tour, decisions call to be made.
Review
The premise for this felt personal. I am not saying that this was a true set of events that had happened but more that it was a heartfelt plea from professional musicians. Designed to help them get the reality out that little gits the world over are getting the attention which many more mature performers are missing, I sympathised.
As a script it tended to try and give explanations rather than delve deeper into why Vikki feels time has passed her by and her responsibility or why Paul may need to find an empathetic dance tutor. Connections to feelings were lost and the reliance on the interplay between them did not really motor the narrative along in the way that would have helped us all feel there was something worthy of contemplating.
The songs which were used tended to be of the same pop variety I am sure an 11-year-old may have coped with, rather than a soul searching torch song to put it all out there and elicit sympathy. But then again, I do not think that was the point, but it left the script lacking in depth.
Direction was all right though both the cramped nature of the venue should have been better considered when trying to work out who stood where and when. The dancing was a little odd, but at least for Paul, it was supposed to be. I think there could have been more consideration to why they seemed to have a lot of movement between them when talking missing rather than adding in scenes that appeared like they were in a club.
Both Paul and Vikki are decent performers, with Paul being a perfect melting pot of insecure social insecurity and Vikki being the more positive, less determined, more changeable dichotomy of a character. The exchanges were believable and, again, it felt personal. What it did not raise itself to was the dramatic and often just felt like girns in a dressing room.
Due to the size of the venue, along with the heatwave outside, we had a large fan which was noisy and whilst having heat relief in the form of the cool air it produced was a winner, it meant that the volume needed cranked up; I was often struggling to hear. I may however be alone in that as I was sitting directly next to the fan. Lighting worked well enough as it was a single lighting state and the sound used was fine, but the keyboard didn’t work well.
This was designed to be light-hearted and that is precisely what it was. There were no revelations nor over the top dramatic moments and did not altogether suffer as a result. But it needed to be sold a little more with a better emotional core which would raise it beyond a curiosity to something really worth hearing. I left wanting to know more about the effect on each of these characters of the 11-year-old “sensation” but only really got a window on that rather than the full house of unrequited expectations.
