Edinburgh Fringe 2025
Untold Stories: Modern Mime Tales
Silent Rocco
Genre: Mime, Physical Comedy, Physical Theatre
Venue: Beside at Pleasance Courtyard
Festival: Edinburgh Fringe
Low Down
Silent Rocco performs a truly enjoyable modern-mime show where personal skills mix with a desire to communicate larger-than-life stories that take the audience on a very entertaining visual journey.
Review
German mime artist Silent Rocco comes to Edinburgh with a solo modern-mime show which in itself is a rarity, in a festival where comedy is at times so overwhelming as to suffocate other theatre genres. That in itself would be a reason for the theatre connoisseur to go see this performance as mime shows are so scarce nowadays. This scarcity is kind of odd in a world where social media bombards us with images, short videos and reel consumption at such a rate as to create a young audience generation which is more visual than it has ever been.
Indeed, in this carousel of mime sketches, the one that really stands out has to do with social media consumption, underlining the modern tone that Rocco gives to his performance. One can really see the effort of the artist to break away from the tenets of classical mime and rejuvenate this form of art. We are witnessing the birth of a new artistic streak which we could define as modern-mime or nouveau mime, pretty much as Cirque du Soleil solidified the concept of nouveau cirque (which surfed on the waves created by scores of artists that had opened the way to this new artistic genre before making it become a box-office hit).
The collective unconscious that leads artists all over the planet to unconsciously create the way to new artistic genres reincarnates in Rocco’s performance. His mime skills are impeccable but it is rather the content of the stories that is particularly intriguing, tackling in a light manner deep subjects such as new media technologies, the conquest of space, individualism and social alienation, relationship with technology, etc.
The performance is carried out in a way which is visually striking and is helped by well-crafted light and sound design. From this perspective, it is worth also praising the light and sound technician accompanying Rocco’s performance, whose skill transforms it into a flawless and three-dimensional visual experience.
Rocco dominates the stage, his world, and it is worth mentioning that he does not fall into the easy trap of audience interaction as many other less accomplished artists would be tempted to do. Entertaining an audience without words is not an easy feat. However, Rocco delivers us a cinematic experience where he explores the interaction between body and elements such as water, zero-gravity space and even the virtual and electronic world, reaching a perfect suspension of disbelief which leaves us in awe.
By touching on universal themes, that would resonate with audiences all over the planet, the show has real potential for world-wide distribution. If you have the chance, go see this show and keep an eye on Rocco. The artist certainly has the potential to develop his work towards even richer dramaturgical creations.
