Review by Corry Shaw

What could be nicer than a leisurely breakfast whilst watching a comedy show? The answer would be either one of those things done well and served separately.

Interactive comedy shows such as this are probably effective in a corporate environment but seem out of place in the comedy programme of an arts festival.  Today’s feast included muesli, fruit salad, a cold poached egg and the comedy character Richard Simms, a none-too-subtle spoof of the American fitness guru Richard Simmons, little known in the UK.

Actor Andy Foreman plays the ever so camp, ever-so-Eighties motivator who bounds into the room in luminous pink shorts and a bad perm to encourage the crowd to stretch out. A couple of minutes he is off again to leave us to our fruit salad.

The food at this point is as good as supermarket muesli and some chopped bananas can be, the comedy element of the show is yet to make an appearance.  As we eat Foreman reappears to have us shout out the names of the fruit in the salad and to mime making a smoothie with an unwilling volunteer. This is something that you may expect to see in a primary school playground. 

After we are served a cold poached egg, a mushroom and a slice of cold, grilled aubergine, myself and my dining companion are asked to come to the stage to exercise our pelvic floor muscles, another couple are shown how to hug then told to wave exercise balls in the air while Foreman sings a song. 

This show pales in comparison to the Interactive Theatre of Australia’s other, Fawlty Towers- themed, fringe show, and feels very much like a cash-in.

Foreman performs for around 20 minutes in several small sections,so you don’t so much feel as if you are watching a show as being interrupted by a madman while having a fairly disappointing breakfast. The ticket price of £20 should demand a full show and a full quality breakfast but both the food and the entertainment are sorely lacking.

Review date: 24 Aug 2009
Reviewed by: Corry Shaw