The Stage

The Reduced Shakespeare Company - Completely Hollywood (Abridged)

Published Thursday 11 August 2005 at 13:45 by Chris Bartlett

On first impressions it would appear that the Reduced Shakespeare Company has done it again. After famously condensing the Bard, the bible and the whole of American history, the Californian troupe now takes on the glories and folly of the silver screen. Like all their best shows it is an unalloyed audience pleaser. The trouble is, beneath the howls of laughter elicited from a mostly school age crowd by the engaging cast, there is the unmistakable feeling that this time their infectious goofing is masking some pretty slim material.

For a start, the show’s premise is an uncharacteristically shaky one. Instead of chronologically replaying the great moments in celluloid history, we have the efforts of Adam Millard’s director, abetted by scriptwriter Aaron Brown and star David Menkin, to make a Hollywood epic on an independent budget, and celebrating all the cliches of Hollywood film-making along the way.

This set-up is just an excuse for a parlour game’s worth of movie jokes - combining two old films to make one new one, with Taxi Driving Miss Daisy the favourite - and bits of dialogue strung together from old movies.

It is fun but it is hardly the hardest of targets and, while the trio has charm to spare, this has to be the sloppiest RSC show to date, even before the jolly but endless audience participation drags the production firmly into holiday camp stage show territory.