Kole Durnford in ‘Insert Clown Here’, Photo by Maxim Luca Bortnowski
I had such a blast at last summer’s Fringe Festival with Parlous Theatre’s high concept parody of 19th century melodrama—a dynamic sketch comedy framework that drops a new clown performer into each performance. After a 2022 workshop and 2023 Fringe run (my review of that iteration here), Insert Clown Here returns to The Theatre Centre’s BMO Incubator (where it was born), having upped its game with a proper set. The pale green stuffiness of Irene Ly’s appropriately mundane Victorian drawing room is the perfect backdrop for the hilarity that ensues as the clown, not knowing the script or blocking, must fumble their way through the drama that unfolds around them.
Written and directed by Kendelle Parks and Jacob Willis, the scripted elements present a hokey, facetious play called “The Visitor,” in which a family—Grandfather (Atlin Hofer), Mother (Margot Greve), siblings Alexander (Kole Durnford) and Alexandra (Ella Berger)—lament their existence while eagerly awaiting the arrival of The Baron. He’s back from The War and the whole family have designs on him, having received multiple love letters addressed to an “Alex” each of the siblings assume must be them. Their much-abused Butler (Nicole Kleiman) can barely get a word in and a third “Alex” (a long-lost lover named Alexis, also Kleiman) adds to the confusion.
The opening night clown performer was Robert Feetham. In a ball cap and holiday shirt, the comic impact of his fish-out-of-water contemporary vibe is immediate. As he tries to suss out everyone’s motivations and finesse his way through seductions and interrogations with improvised sonnets, haphazard philosophical musings and anecdotes about his experiences in The War; the other actors try to keep the story on track. Feetham’s endearing persona is awkwardly accommodating as he valiantly tries to ingratiate himself to everyone, all the while being constantly pulled this way and that by demanding characters who keep forcing him into tight corners.
Through extravagant gestures and clichéd rhetoric, this team maintains a solid and giddy pastiche of melodramatic tropes with a satisfying balance of linguistic and physical gags. Our awareness of the theatrical references and the frantic, sink-or-swim urgency of improv are an enduring engine for silly antics. The whole ensemble has refined chemistry. I am partial to Durnford’s bulging eyes and lanky frame, a particularly striking visual as he careers across the stage with ludicrous momentum. His increasingly competitive dynamic with Berger, as they fight for Feetham’s attention, makes for some of the best feigned tension. And Kleiman has a knack for punctuating scenes with elegantly dejected exits.
Absurdly raised stakes, smashed furniture and hilarious mishaps abound as the story barrels towards its farcically dire conclusion. Shout out to Mathilda Kane’s subdued and evocative lighting design. The dim and sombre atmosphere feels distinctly Chekovian, with archly dramatic spots used sparingly for well-integrated emphasis. Christopher-Elizabeth’s sound design and some fog effects contribute to an impressively persuasive, fiery finale. This outlandish denouement, which struck me as limp and muddled at my Fringe experience, feels tighter here—though it could be that it just finally clicked for me.
My favourite of the featured props is a loose window frame the characters, at key moments, hold up and peer through emphatically!—an emblematic image that just tickles me, every time, encapsulating the goofy artifice and thrilling spontaneity of the whole concept.
Parlous Theatre has developed a simple, solid framework here that has the potential for great longevity. As each clown performer, bringing their own unique quirks to the scenario, intrudes upon the forced dignity of the faux- classical aesthetics, they keep it all fresh and buoyant. This is my jam and I’m absolutely down for more rounds of it.
Insert Clown Here
running May 8 to May 19, 2024
The Theatre Centre, BMO Incubator (1115 Queen St. West)
running time: 65 to 75 minutes (no intermission)
Atlin Hofler, Margot Greve, Kole Durnford and Ella Berger (left), Margot Greve (right) in ‘Insert Clown Here’, Photos by Maxim Luca Bortnowski