We worked at this event last year although at the time it was called Diversions Temple Bar and it partly fell victim to the weather that we had last year, so we wanted to go back there this year and really nail the whole thing from start to finish. For details of what happened last year at this event you are going to have to look back in time to our blog from last year. At this event we were also graced with the presence of Palle from Denmark aka Mr Toons or if you prefer the professional idiot. Palle i think i can safely say is one of the true gentlemen of our business and we were privleged to have been able to spend time with the guy. He arrived the week before the Dublin Circus Festival for another event and had spent the week staying with us in Kerry. Roanldo had him as a house guest for the week and we both took him out to experience the joy of surfing the waves off the atlantic coast. Palle took to the water and fearlessly took on everything that Inch and Gowlane could throw at him. By the end he even caught a few waves and bought a wetsuit from our good friend Inch Con who sells eco friendly wetsuits on his website www.humanseals.com (shameless plug). Anyway apart from being a nice human being Palle is also a consumate performer and his show, even though i have seen it over ten times at this stage always puts a smile on my face. It is clever inventive full of joy and playfulness and contains a grandstand finale. Indeed i have rarely seen a better street show since i first saw Palle and his partner perform as a double act called the loyal club at the busking competition years ago in the Killarney Summerfest.
I am happy to say that we suceeded in our mission and we pulled out four really good shows although it did rain during two of our shows but it was only a drizzle and the audience stayed to see the end of the show despite the rain. This i would always see as a really nice confidence booster and a very nice indirect compliment to our work because if people are willing to stay and still watch your show while being made uncomfortable by weather then that means your material can really hold the attention which is good. We even had one show in a venue in cows lane which when we turned up seemed quite and not very promising but turned out to be a great show.
Downsides of Dublin can include barmy traffic and illogical one way systems which are in my opinion designed to infuriate drivers so much that they just give up and walk. But to make up for this the people we were working for really made our job easier by being really nice and professional. Everything was really well timetabled and publicised and ran as scheduled. That is all you can ask for really. Our demands are normally modest enough and when we requested a trolley to help us to move our equipment from one performance space to another we were not only provided with a trolley but we also got bodies to help us to move our stuff. So you can pretty much put up with minor headaches like the traffic and the weather when you are dealing with people whose aim it is is to help you achieve your goal to entertain the ass off people. Mission accomplished. Special mention must go here out to the Production Manager Denis from Cork who was a model of professionalism and a paragon of calm under pressure. Anything you asked him for or any queries you had were met with a smile and an easy solution.
Good food on this trip was provided by the Chandni resturant in Ballsbridge a real find on the culinary front. Palle, Ronaldo and i ate there and all gave it the thumbs up. We also ate in a lebanese resturant called the Cedar Tree in the center of the city, our meal in the cedar tree was accompanied by a young lady belly dancing which was distracting to say the least. An idea perhaps for other resturants to drum up business in this age of recession put on a floxsome fillie performing some gyrations while you eat under the pretense of culture. Bring it on i say.
Another good thing that happened was that we got to go on weekend blend which is a radio show on Newstalk featuring the presenting skills of Claire Mckowen. To be honest we were nervous about doing this as it went out live and we were not sure if we could convey what we do or our zany personalities on the radio. Happily Claire made feel really at ease and the whole experience went well apart perhaps from myself declaring on the public airwaves that one of the advantages that we as performers living the travelling life have is that we get to see parts of Ireland that no one has ever seen (muppet).
The Fanizni collective also got to see some of the other shows that were going on as part of the event. This does not always happen as you are setting up sets taking downs sets or have your head in your own show so much that you dont see other acts. Happily this time we had loads of time to see other performances. Now before i go on i should point out that taste is subjective and an act that i slag of as brutal is just me expressing a personal opinion, it does not mean that the act is bad per se. I know what i like i like slapstick i like spectacle. I dont like farfing about it dont like interpretive dance or art that takes itself too seriously.
So the acts first Dave Macsavage now Dave was not a part of the programme he was just there busking his show but he really blew me away. What he does is a brand of stand up comedy mixed with music. He spent ages gathering a crowd by simply interacting with passers by. Basically taking the piss out of people and generally having the crack with people. Pure brilliant. Much of his material came across as spontaneous. Admittedly some of the material was right on the edge of good taste but you got to take your hat off to the guy for being out there and risking it all for a laugh. He reminded me in some aspects of Johnny Massacre in the way he built his crowd and the anarchic atmosphere he created.
Next up was Scarabeus-Dance Antigue now for anyone whose stomach cant handle a critical mauling i advise you to skip ahead to the next paragraph cos this aint gonna be pretty. This was described in the programme as a spectacular ariel and stilts performance that will thrill and delight all who dare to watch. And in fairness it was spectacular or at least spectacularly bad. Now it promised a lot, we had been around all day while they set up an impressive rig and i thought this is going to be good. How wrong i was the ariel stuff was insignifigant and the stilt parts were full of self indulgent farfing about faux art dance movement and loads of slow movement that spoke of a group of performers taking themselves far too seriously. This was not helped by the fact that the performers all wore masks which were visually nice but acted as a barrier between the performers and audience and killed any rapport or intimacy that could have been generated. When you compare this group say to our own Tumble Circus who perform cutting edge routines and spectacular ariel stuff in a really entertaining context it really puts muck like this show in perspective. In fairness it was not all bad and the good thing was that this show was only about a half an hour long. This half an hour seemed like an eternity and the performance recieved a muted applause from an audiences that seemed decidedly underwhelmed. This in contrast to say a Tumble circus show which can last for up to an hour which can seem to fly and will leave the audience feeling satisfied and baying for more.







Now i would have gone away from this show in a bad mood had i not decided to stay around to se Mr Toons show which was like a balm for my soul. Brilliant in every aspect full of joy and good humour and a really friendly vibe between an apprecative audience and a performer whose timing is truly perfect and at the very top of his game.
Next up to brave my critical barbs is a group/individual called Nakupelle these people performed two shows one a one man show and the other a two man piece. Now i only saw the one man show so i will reserve judgement on the two man piece the one man piece was magical a glorious virtouso mixture of slapstick comedy and skill all performed around the simple premise of an incompetent man who was trying to put a plant pot up on a high platform. This involved the use of an A frame ladder which was climbed, fallen off etc pure genius and really daring not just artistically but also you could really get hurt doing this stuff. On top of this the act harked back in some aspects to the comedy of Keaton and chaplin and Lloyd in that it was reallly simple and universal. The show was also helped by the fact that the performer picked a volunteers who relished his place in the spotlight and palyed to the crowd. All in all a great act that truly deserved to be seen by a bigger audience than was there for the show. Note to self, must see more of these guys.








Back to brutal the Insect Circus now in fairness these lads were not pure arty crap like Scarebus its just that the show was good just not good enough. The show featured various performers performing various acts which were good just not great. I also thought that the pace of the show was too slow and some of the individual acts lacked any energy or spark. Now in fairness there was some good stuff including a lady who performed a really good hula hoop routine and Ronaldo also liked a part where a lady pushed swords through box which contained a human/insect. The idea of the show was also good but there was just too many weak sections to forgive the good stuff. I just got bored and drifted away during the finale cos i figured life is too short to waste it and i also wanted to get a sandwich.
Last on the list and also the last show that i saw was a guy Yodel again a balm to the soul a really good show that made me laugh and forget all my cares for a half an hour. To be honest it had been a long weekend and i had planned to get straight into the van and bail out as quickly as possible so i went along to this show just to have a quick look and i was enjoying it so much that i stayed for the whole show and was glad that i did. This guy came on dressed in lederhosen and invited us into his unique world of manic comedy and chaotic leek dancing. This was balanced however by some really good skill and some really clever original ideas such as playing Vivaldi on bicycle horns while riding an 8 foot unicycle. Yodels interaction with the audience was also spot on and i thought that there was a level of bizzareness that had you standing there thinking to yourself "am i really witnessing this". An example of this was when he took to dancing around to an alpine song while slapping himself on the arms and legs with several leeks.