Mythology of pathology

0 From Greek myths to Hollywood glamour

title is mania itself, with its promises of greatness and guarantees of success.

But it’s downhill from there, all the way down to the underworld of acute mental illness, institutionalisation and related challenges to empathy and identity itself.

This latest solo show from Johnjoseph powerfully

mobilises the distinctive forms and sensibilities that make them such a rich, compelling artist.

There’s the chic and charismatic stage presence; the fusion of witty, acerbic storytelling with resonant, quavering cover versions (including Warwick, Kate Bush and Sufjan Stevens); and the deft mobilisation of registers ranging across classical mythology, cinematic glamour, theoretical discourse, Catholic dogma and Scouse nous.

It’s all used here in the service of a deeply humane story in which – flipping the mythological script – it’s Eurydice who must journey among the damned for Orpheus’s sake Johnjoseph renders Orpheus’s mental institution with vivid, faintly surreal detail, animating a range of other patients and a no-nonsense fellow visitor.

It’s a bravura piece that provocatively links insanity, fame, art, class, queerness and politics, asking what’s at stake in accepted divisions of the normal and the mad.

And the writing is a joy: doctors “sweep through the wards once or twice a day like medieval bishops”.

BEN WALTERS

Until 26 August. Today 4;10pm.

A compelling performance by Michelle Sewell shines through some of the longueurs of her own script in this story of a young woman’s search for her prince (and a marriage visa).

Sewell plays Alice, a somewhat naive young woman from Sydney, entranced by the version of happy-everafter sold to her by the Disney princesses of her childhood (the misspelling of “Disney” in the title is just so the Norwich-based HACK Theatre Company don’t get sued by the House of Mouse).

In love with love, Alice waits for her boyfriend in London – who she calls “Prince” – to come through with a proposal while she backtracks through her formative experiences with boys trying to relate everything through the animated technicolor prism of fairytales.

Sewell does very well to make Alice relatable. In other hands, it would be easy to mistake her naiveté for a lack of intelligence but she is, in some ways, a charming innocent no matter how many men she’s slept with. Cleverly intercut with video excerpts of Alice with her Fairy Godmother (therapist) this builds to a strong resolution that finally explains much of Alice’s character and ultimately makes it worthwhile. RORY FORD

Until 25 August. Tomorrow 3:40pm.