What Doesn’t Kill You [blah blah] Stronger | The Parlour at The Pleasure Garden | Until 24 Jun | ★ ★ ★ ★ ★
In a small and intimate tent in the back corner of The Pleasure Garden you’ll find the cabaret show What Doesn’t Kill You [blah blah] Stronger which is delightful musical journey through tales of hardship and survival.
Created by local group Holland Street Productions this show is a marvelous romp through some disastrous tales of survival from mutineers abandoned on deserted islands filled with rats, to fears of exploding toilets, sinking ships, falling bombs and bad decisions.
It’s all set to song and filled with clever and witty observations, it’s the kind of cabaret that will totally tickle your fancy, or even ‘gilbert’ your ‘sullivan’.
In an action-packed hour-long show performers Tyler Jacob Jones and Erin Hutchinson take us on a tour of tales filled with calamities and crisis. They’re all stories of people in a really bad situation who managed to pull through and see a brighter day.
The show is made up of original songs composed by Jones and collaborator Robert Woods, and the amazing Joe Louis Robinson is on the keyboards to bring them to life. It’s worth mentioning that Jones and Hutchison can not only both sing really well, but they are also brilliant comics too.
Working their way through different musical genres and myriad characters and narratives, the duo worked hard to bring the stories to life. At time they were each playing multiple characters, a hectic but hilarious experience.
This show is tight, well-rehearsed and comedy gold. It’s in a tiny venue, so tickets are selling out fast. Do your best to catch one of the remaining shows.
If there’s an award for best portrayal of a cat in Fringe World show, Hutchinson is surely a contender.
See What Doesn’t Kill You [blah blah] Stronger at Fringe World.
Graeme Watson is an editor at OUTinPerth. He has a background in journalism, creative writing, dance, theatre, radio and film working as a performer, producer and writer. Graeme writes for a variety of publications and has been working as a reviewer since 1997.
