Written for Culture WarsLet’s be honest, Psy isn’t going to win prizes for its groundbreaking exploration of mental health issues. Its line-up of kooks and fruit-loops are characterised with all the complexity of an amateur production of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. From the whooping manic to the blank-faced amnesiac via a self-scratching addict, each of the various conditions is played exactly as one would expect. In fact, it comes dangerously close to disrespecting its subject by turning mental illness into a string of easy gags. Whisper it, but we’re not supposed to do that these days...
Let’s be honest, though, that’s not why you’ve come to Psy, is it? And, though it might nag at you a little afterwards (the whole PC thing really is deeply indoctrinated), it doesn’t affect your enjoyment of what is – from first to last – an astonishing piece of circus that manages to interrogate the form without sacrificing the slightest sniff of populism.
Essentially, each of the various disorders is twinned with a particular traditional circus act, such that the red-eyed insomniac slides perilously down a Chinese pole and the addict is encircled in the tumble of a German wheel. In many ways the show becomes topsy-turvy. Rather than the circus revealing something about its subject, the subject reveals the nature of the individual apparatus. A quality of a particular feat is drawn out and brought to the fore. Here, we spot the exhilaration behind the German wheel, the way it traps the performer in a seductive pas de deux, the downwards spiral, the speed, the blur, the headrush. Or else we spot the simple pleasure of seeing objects anew, detached from purpose, as the juggling amnesiac picks up his clubs and starts to play.
It is all phenomenally directed by Shana Carroll, who understands that to showcase a single performer is no longer enough to grip us. Instead, individual acts become centrepieces, surrounded by echoes and ripples. As Florent LeStage swirls clubs above his head, another performer chews newspaper and spits it into the air, mirroring the movement in a subtly delightful way. Nor does Carroll constantly aim for the most complex, daring choreography. There is an elevation of simplicity that respects the apparatus, tuning into the motion at its core and emphasising it with a clever mix of synchronicity, stillness and counter-motion. It is delights the eyes as frequently as it enraptures the heart.
Beyond this, Les 7 Doigts de la Main has banished the self-satisfied aloofness that so often accompanies circus in a bid to boost its sex appeal. The pouting catwalk chic is instead replaced with personality – often even goofiness – that brings a different attraction. Here there is something more cutely fanciable than detachedly gawp-worthy. It’s as playful as a wink, full of wit and kooky charisma.
All of which confirms Les 7 Doigts... as one of the brightest sparks in world circus. Psy truly is mindblowing.
Let’s be honest, though, that’s not why you’ve come to Psy, is it? And, though it might nag at you a little afterwards (the whole PC thing really is deeply indoctrinated), it doesn’t affect your enjoyment of what is – from first to last – an astonishing piece of circus that manages to interrogate the form without sacrificing the slightest sniff of populism.
Essentially, each of the various disorders is twinned with a particular traditional circus act, such that the red-eyed insomniac slides perilously down a Chinese pole and the addict is encircled in the tumble of a German wheel. In many ways the show becomes topsy-turvy. Rather than the circus revealing something about its subject, the subject reveals the nature of the individual apparatus. A quality of a particular feat is drawn out and brought to the fore. Here, we spot the exhilaration behind the German wheel, the way it traps the performer in a seductive pas de deux, the downwards spiral, the speed, the blur, the headrush. Or else we spot the simple pleasure of seeing objects anew, detached from purpose, as the juggling amnesiac picks up his clubs and starts to play.
It is all phenomenally directed by Shana Carroll, who understands that to showcase a single performer is no longer enough to grip us. Instead, individual acts become centrepieces, surrounded by echoes and ripples. As Florent LeStage swirls clubs above his head, another performer chews newspaper and spits it into the air, mirroring the movement in a subtly delightful way. Nor does Carroll constantly aim for the most complex, daring choreography. There is an elevation of simplicity that respects the apparatus, tuning into the motion at its core and emphasising it with a clever mix of synchronicity, stillness and counter-motion. It is delights the eyes as frequently as it enraptures the heart.
Beyond this, Les 7 Doigts de la Main has banished the self-satisfied aloofness that so often accompanies circus in a bid to boost its sex appeal. The pouting catwalk chic is instead replaced with personality – often even goofiness – that brings a different attraction. Here there is something more cutely fanciable than detachedly gawp-worthy. It’s as playful as a wink, full of wit and kooky charisma.
All of which confirms Les 7 Doigts... as one of the brightest sparks in world circus. Psy truly is mindblowing.
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