Blue Love
Written by Fi Wells
THEATRE IN REVIEW
Devised and choreographed by Shaun Parker and starring Parker and Lucia Mastrantone, Glenn and Rhonda Flune invite us into their living room (aka The Love Arena) for their universally recognisable love story.
Warming up the crowd with (free!) beer and popcorn and some flirtatious crowd lap-sitting and Polaroid-snapping, the kitschy couple create a comfy and familiar vibe before the action gets underway.
It could be the story of any couple; they meet, fall in love, marry, get a dog. When the relationship takes the predictable downhill turn they try to fill the hole their passion once occupied, with kids, a house and matching musical instrument lessons. We are privy to the inner workings of their relationship as they relay their story to us, taking sly digs at each other as they try to convince themselves that their love is something special.
Always flipping the pages of his 70s porn magazine, Glenn strays even further, shagging the actress that plays his wife in the three short arty films that are weaved into the performance. The hilarious final act had the whole crowd laughing out loud, as Glenn and Rhonda argued using only the lines of well-known love songs. Highlight of the whole hour for me was thanks to Mastrantone’s perfectly comically timed response to Parker’s plea ‘Am I ever gonna see your face again?’
The flier describes ‘Blue Love’ as a ‘postmodern pastiche’. Sure, you could call it postmodern in that it can’t be boxed into any one category of theatre, with film, dance, song, text and some partial nudity all employed in the telling of the story. Hence the ‘pastiche’. You could also call it arthouse, absurdist and a touch disjointed at times, in part due to the multimedia approach. A thin layer of cheese pervades, but despite my scepticism of such gourmet delights, it is this that makes it unique and funny. The more heart-rending stuff is expressed mostly through the choreography, which takes Blue Love to a place beyond the cheese. As it teeters on the edge of normal, though, there is a big serve of cliché and popular culture, which actually gives the show its wit and charm. By not shying away from the predictability of love and romance, ‘Blue Love’ both mocks and enlightens the subject.
‘Blue Love’ was presented by La Boite Theatre.
