Beautiful oddity from Chaplin’s grandson
The Toad Knew King’s, Edinburgh
The renowned, Swiss-born circus theatre maker James Thiérrée has an exceptional artistic pedigree. He’s the grandson of Charlie Chaplin, and his parents – Victoria Chaplin and Jean-Baptiste Thiérrée – were the founders of a series of leading French circus companies. This heritage is writ large in The
the show that Thiérrée’s Compagnie du Hanneton has brought to the Edinburgh International Festival. It’s performed by a cast of six, including Thiérrée, who is also its creator, designer and composer.
This fantasia – which takes place in an extraordinary netherworld of animalistic machines, steaming water and a sinister pianola – has a decidedly Gallic flavour. The surrealism of André Breton combines with the cartoonish, post-apocalyptic vision of Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Marc Caro’s bleakly comic film Delicatessen, as well as the acrobatics of cirque nouveau. The show seems to emanate from a surreal dream world of buried fears and suppressed desires.
Thiérrée, who bears a striking physical resemblance to his grandfather, also shares Chaplin’s tremendous skill in physical comedy. In one lovely set-piece, he mimes numerous, futile attempts to move his diminutive sidekick Yann Nédélec.
The bringing together of such simple, timeless pleasures of popular entertainment with Thiérrée’s bizarre visual imagination and his vivid, often emotive music is masterful. This is accompanied, wonderfully, by the soulful, plaintive singing of Sierra Leonean performer Mariama and the astonishing work of the technical team. It all makes for a unique experience – small wonder that the Edinburgh premiere of this beautiful oddity was cheered to the rafters.