BY SIMONE MEDONOS
[star rating = 4/5]
Terry Alderton: The Musical
A mannequin with a white dog’s face and a brown tail in its lab coat pocket stands upright on stage as we enter the lecture theatre. I do a double take in case it’s a real person. It’s not. A keyboard and guitar sit on the opposite side of the stage with a red sequinned jacket, promise of the musical to come.
Strange haunting 20s music turns to a heavy beat. Terry Alderton skips out on stage and demands the man in the front row licks his head. I begin to wonder how I am going to explain this to anyone.
The pace is fast, the audience have to concentrate to keep up. Latecomers are treated to a clever rewind of the first few minutes. Terry is so quick off the mark it’s sometimes excruciating trying to work out what the last minute meant, and then the story switches.
With the first ‘song’ Bipolar Man, it starts to make a little more sense; battling with the voices in his head, various characters pop out, a Doctor of Time Travel, David Attenborough, Terry’s feet, which take on a life of their own, and the imaginary friend from his youth, Bogey.
Luckily for us his wife calls him 40 minutes in where he cleverly explains to her what’s going on and what’s about to happen – and the fact that no one in the audience gets it. I’m still confused, does he keep her in a jam jar? Does he even have an eleven year old son?
Written by Terry with music by Grammy nominee Owen Parker, the show oozes with stunning preparation, quick wit, fantastic body popping yet I leave dizzy and baffled.
Funny, witty, mad and strange, get your brain ready for an hour in the gym.
