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A
Very Naughty Boy - The Life of Graham Chapman Group: Vivienne Smith Management |
| Andrew Chippindale | |
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Adrian Poynton's life of Graham Chapman has performed a minor miracle - not in a show-offy way, you understand - but in a terribly good-natured, understated way. He has written (and indeed performs in) a show about the life and times of this tragic Python, which, as well as being charming and moving, is also very funny indeed without once feeling like it is competing with Flying Circus material. Chapman's life is hardly the stuff of easy laughs either. Confronting his homosexuality when it was still subject to prosecution and potential ruin, overcoming his shyness through increasing reliance on alcohol and then managing to beat his alcoholism only to die of cancer some years later. The show, through an astute mixture of stiff-upper-lipped, RP restraint and a public-schoolboyish sense of fun manages to keep making jokes and looking on the bright side of life in a very British fashion. Purists may take issue with the fact that neither Poynton (Chapman) nor Tom Price (Cleese) bear much physical resemblance to their characters, however this is the sort of quibble that is quickly forgotten about since both actors are very funny in their own right, as well as both being far better actors than accomplished comedians deserve to be. It takes a great deal more skill, after all, to be able to muck about quite so convincingly before turning on a pin's head to deliver moments of real emotional force. Comic shows based on the lives of famous comics are increasingly ten a penny on the fringe. Where A Very Naughty Boy stands head and shoulders above the competition is that alongside saying more both about the man and his world than such shows usually manage, it also makes you consider love, life, death and fear in a far more immediate way than half a dozen Ibsens could, and leaves you feeling moved, touched and thoroughly entertained. 30
July to 25 August.
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