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| Marcel Cole in SMILE: The Story of Charlie Chaplin. |
Written and Performed by Marcel Cole – Directed by Mirjana Ristevski.
Tuggeranong Arts Centre, November 9th 2024.
Reviewed by BILL STEPHENS
There is brilliance on display in this intriguing
production, but there are also unsolved problems which during its first
Canberra performance at the Tuggeranong Arts Centre last night made it feel
like a work in progress.
Hailed around the country for his brilliant debut cabaret The
Ukulele Man in which he traces the life and career of British vaudevillian,
George Formby, Marcel Cole now reveals skills as a brilliant mime artist and accomplished
ballet dancer with his show about an even more famous screen personality
Charlie Chaplin.
Again directed by Mirjana Ristevski with whom he created The
Ukulele Man, Cole tells Chaplin’s story through an astute selection of filmed
titles and images in the style of one of Chaplin’s silent films.
Costumed as Chaplin’s familiar Little Tramp character, complete
with whiteface make-up and black toothbrush moustache, Cole made his entrance
down the steep steps of the Tuggeranong Arts Centre theatre, immediately
engaging the audience with his mastery of Chaplin’s signature walk and movement
style, his mime clear and concise.
Assuming the persona of the little tramp he discovers a
red-covered copy of Chaplin’s autobiography
and begins his story, selecting incidents at random from the book, commencing with
Chaplin’s 1925 silent movie The Gold Rush, filmed at a time when Chaplin’s silent
screen persona as The Little Tramp was already well established as an audience
favourite.
For these live re-enactments Cole selects random members of
his audience to assist him by playing various supporting characters. This risky
strategy depends on the ability of the unfortunate ‘volunteer’ to be amusing.
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| Marcel Cole and audience member. |
While those selected certainly did their best to be co-operative, and there were some funny moments, the overuse of this ploy, together with the necessity for Cole to drop character to murmur instructions to his ‘volunteers’, detracted from the magic of his silent mime, caused the pacing and flow of the storytelling to flag.
It also led to trivialising important moments in Chaplin’s
life such as the onset of his mother’s dementia and eventual death, which
hardly seemed subjects for hilarity.
A stunning dance sequence later in the show for which Cole
stripped to black trunks and utilised a white balloon and his impressive ballet
technique to represent Chaplin’s satirical masterpiece The Great Dictator
was marred when the balloon was thrown into the audience. Of course the
audience had fun circulating the balloon around the auditorium, but the
brilliance of the original concept became irrelevant.
Cole and his director Ristevski have created a fascinating entertainment
to showcase more of Cole’s talents. But Chaplin is a far more important and
complex character than Formby, and despite the rapturous reception by the
capacity audience at this performance, SMILE: The story of Charlie Chaplin,
seems confused as to its purpose, particularly during the later sections
involving incidents when Chaplin had long since left the Little Tramp behind, but
Cole still presented in whiteface.
Only part of Chaplin’s long and complex life was concerned
with his most famous creation, the Little Tramp. By trying to compress the
whole of his story into just 60 minutes, Cole does himself and his subject a
disservice.
By concentrating on just the Little Tramp period of
Chaplin’s career Cole would still have a captivating piece of entertainment with
which to display his undoubted mime skills.
However in choosing Chaplin as their subject Cole and Ristevski have struck gold with a subject that both have the skills and talents to develop into something far more important. Should they choose to take up that challenge, future audiences can look forward to something very special.
Images by Cassidy Richens
This review first published in the digital edition of CITY NEWS on 10.11.24