Irie - "A Great Show"

Although there is no song and dance, Irie is a traditional revue in its approach to its material.

Patrick brown, the author, pokes fun at our foibles as a society, but does so in a way that assures us that he is quite fond of the society.

His themes are often serious ones corruption in the church; male compulsive sexual behaviour; the parasitical pseudo-artiste; the ‘butu in the Benz ‘; wife beating; infidelity of husbands (and of friends with husbands) and anancyism in all areas of life. In most cases humor is sensitive to the seriousness of these concerns.

He even eschews lightheartedness done to win easy humour , but opts to let his (disapproving) authorial voice come through . An example of this is one of his knocks at the battering of females when he moves away from a potentially funny, but light-hearted punch line in order to underpin his disapproval.

And yet the revue is very, very funny. Some old tricks of the trade are employed by the author. The lustful parson says:

“The child is ready … er .. for the Lord!” Malapropisms drop from the mouth of the drunk in his funeral oration. There is also good situation humor.

He has a takeoff of Montel Williams in which he has the audience completely involved.

But for a few occasions his punch lines are solid- the one involving John Junor brings the house down and has , appropriately , been moved to the end of the show.

Those who are familiar with Mr. Brown’s work have come to expect some ‘excrement’ jokes and they are here. He still has difficulty making them tasteful so those who are here put off by them have to endure them have to endure them in order to enjoy all of the good stuff. Thankfully, they are few. Two other brick-bats must be thrown. One involves his treatment of his ‘butu’ which seems a bit sneering at genuine ‘don’t-know-better ignorance.

In the other he has a sexy, skimpily-dressed actress come across stage with a sign and then return to say “ For those who can’t read it say  “For those who can ‘t read it says ‘four hours later’’’’. He seem here to bypass the humor as one assumes that the reason for a male patron missing the sign would have been the revealing bathsuit . This was not clear and surprised as the direction is always slick and done in such a way as to give the audience every ounce of potential humor in the script. The production is well structured and items.

The production is well structured and items flow comfortably. The casting is excellent and the actors play well against each other. Each person is given a chance to shine and do they glitter! The acting ranges from good to excellent and they lend layers of meaning and humor to the writing.

If one has to single out any performer, it is Winston Bell for the way he take on the challenge of dominating the show after the intermission.

But all of the performances are bobbling, yet sensitive at times; rambunctious, yet subtle when this could add a bit extra.

The acting is, actually, the high point of the show.