Hard Hearted Hannah and other stories

Published Thursday 22 May 2008 at 13:20 by Emma Barnett

Improvisation in the UK is usually reserved for comedy shows but Cartoon de Salvo, a three-person theatre company, are trying to change that. Each night two guys (Brian Logan and Neil Haigh) and a girl (Alex Murdoch) go on stage, ask the audience to think up a title and to pick three songs from their repertoire listed on a blackboard. They then go about making a play, armed with not much more than some funky musical instruments and a few chairs.

The result is fantastic. The audience is behind them from the start as they have been encouraged to participate in the creation process. The night in question, the play became The Forgotten One at the enthusiastic suggestion of a theatre student in the front row.

Slowly but surely a tale about a space voyage undertaken by an American, a British, and a Russian astronaut as a symbol of international peace between the world’s old power axis, emerged from the whirring minds of the actors. This was accompanied by an eclectic soundtrack including Mamma Told Me Not to Come and the slightly less mainstream, New Delhi Freight Train.

But it doesn’t really matter what the play is actually about, the audience’s enjoyment comes from watching these three very talented and quick-witted actors come up with interesting characters, new scenes and just bounce off each other without really know where it’s going. Occasionally they allow the audience to know they are struggling, but that just adds to the beauty and comedy of the spectacle.

Logan’s particularly impressive strength is creating the mental pictures of how each character looks and should be perceived, as well instigating a lot of the scenes. Murdoch, the female player, adds the quirky element, coming up with the more leftfield characters while her facial contortions and brilliant comedy value. Haigh has a great vocal range and carries off portrayals of both genders with surprising aplomb, often slipping in and out of extremely manly men, to extremely female women.

All three are talented musicians and singers. The live music is a good lynch pin in each newly created play for both the actors and audience. For the actors, it gives them something definite to work around as well as buying them thinking time and for the audience, it guarantees points of polished performance.

It’s definitely something more actors should try their hand at and more theatre-loving audiences should be exposed to.