COMEDY
Showing @ Assembly George Square until 29 August @ 22:30
Fourteen years ago, Simon Morley and David Friend were sitting in their bedrooms, entertaining themselves with their unique talent of creating recognisable shapes with his penis and testicles. Today, their concept is touring around the world to packed-out audiences, everyone keen to see just how much can be done with such unusual and highly sensitive equipment. In its Fringe run, Fitchy and Rich Binning perform naked on stage as they twist, stretch and squeeze their genitalia into all kinds of weird shapes while everything is projected onto a giant screen for the audience’s viewing pleasure – and this time, it’s in 3D.
Puppetry of the Penis: 3D does start entertainingly, with laughs, shocks and shrieks aplenty. But as the show wears on, the novelty – believe it or not – starts to wane, and it’s disappointing that there is nothing more to the production than one “installation” after another. There is no attempt at moulding any of it into some kind of narrative, and its mostly absent reference to current affairs makes it rather sterile and timeless for the wrong reasons. The addition of 3D is little more than a gimmick, making the whole idea of seeing 3D penises more of a laugh than the bog-standard 2D variety. Technically it does little to enhance the production as only one visual actually comes “out” of the screen while the rest remain conventionally flat. It’s also quite hard for the eyes to adjust between the live action on stage and that on the screen, especially on the occasions that the performers stand directly in front of it.
With tickets at £17.50 a head, this is a very commercial operation and pretty steep when really you’re only seeing a couple of overgrown schoolboys exhibit themselves. That said, you’re unlikely to ever see anything quite as bizarre, and it certainly draws in the crowds. While men are by no means low in number, this is, unsurprisingly, the perfect start to a girls’ night out.
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