Ben Yoganathan, Nicholas Eddie & Rachel Cucheron in Ooga Chaka | Photo provided by the company
Presented by Pucker’s with Parlous Theatre
This is quintessential Fringe fare and a crowd pleaser. It knows its audience, it knows this moment and it boasts a team of beloved local talent (on and off stage), including a recent Dora winner! To enhance the silly, prehistoric immersion, cute, QR-coded pepples are distributed to audience members as they arrive and I can imagine a theatre-full of rowdy stans throwing them at me in Cro-Magnon rage when I confess that… I didn’t love Ooga Chaka.
That said, I didn’t hate it either. I concur with a follow Fringer when they confided to me that… It’s fine.
Ethan Zuchkan’s hit or miss script has a serviceable (sporatically brilliant) sketch comedy premise about a prehistoric village wrestling with the forces of art and commerce. When Rock (Nicholas Eddie, tongue lodged gloriously in cheek), a sleazy cave art dealer, finally sucks all the fun out of the artistic process for bestie collaborators, Bungu (Ben Yoganathan) and Kiki (Rachel Cucheron), the two embark on a radical new venture—moving cave paintings! As they brainstorm this idea and eventually get the thing up on its feet, we realize that what they’re making is… theatre.
The very silly plot pits artistic integrity and friendship against populist entertainment and business. I found the story-within-a-story mythos a bit muddled and hard to track. The subject of all this art is a local legend, a village hero named Groog, who… saved them from famine? Took down some mammoths? Something about a volcano? Whatever, it’s really just these broad strokes that are important to understanding why they are all so invested.
By the end, Cucheron and Yoganathan hold the friendship storyline together with some emotive sincerity, but most of this is deliberately and deliciously over-the-top. As Horp, a much-abused assistant to Rock, Kole Durnford, with his expressively lanky frame clownishly contorted, is serving up some heightened, self-aware schtick. Ben Kopp, Margot Greve and Ruaridh MacDonald are a uniformly amusing ensemble. Kopp’s, uh, resting stone-age face pretty much killed me, every time. MacDonald, an understated oafish presence throughout, really shines in his final surprise appearance. I don’t want to spoil who he is, but he seems to be channelling a bizarre, hippie amalgam of Bubbles (Trailer Park Boys) and Mel Brooks.
郝邦宇 Steven Hao’s consistently compelling and playful direction amplifies the aesthetic and performative artifice. It’s all very stylish. His vision, the script and the vibes all perfectly align for me when we get to the chaos of the rehearsal process, when the strain of production, egos and artistic conflicts reach a fever pitch. This sequence, and the subsequent pretentious performance art parody, are hilarious. It’s got some satirical bite and industry folks in particular will likely feel very seen and lampooned.
Mathilda Kane (lighting) and Abbey Kruse (sound) have done fine work, but it’s Sabrina Pye (set, props) and Claudia Matas (costumes) that feel highlighted here with their vivid and amusing prehistoric elements fused with modern flourishes. This world has a goofy, Flintstones charm with its painted boulders and fake fur.
I had a good time. Some people around me were having the best time. Who knows where you’ll fit in that spectrum, but I imagine that the audience-performer dynamic here could make Ooga Chaka a transcendent experience for you.
