Gaggle

In a show designed specifically for teenagers with complex ASN, but also suitable for children aged five and over with ASN, Dunoon and Glasgow based theatre company Tenterhooks bring the delightful Gaggle to Scottish stages.

An instantaneous rapport is created with the small assembling audience at North Edinburgh Arts’ theatre space with musician Kerry Cleland weaving around the space and playing what is an apparently silent accordion. The sensitive introduction quietly allows the instrument to be played as the show progresses without alarm being created.  In the centre of the small, elevated stage stands a fabric lighthouse that is replicated in the exquisite costumes of the 3 pompom hatted lighthouse keepers played by Michelle Ross (who does some impressive pole work), Ronan McMahon and Lucy McGreal. These three take us through the calms and storms of life both in and at sea with the deceptive simplicity of good clowning.

The wonderful Sita Pieraccini, who has composed the show’s music, provides repetition of simple lines like ‘looking high and low, we are the keeper of the glow’ or ‘we are in the blue sea.’ The sheer magic of lights changing colour before your very eyes thanks to Lighting Designer Kate Bonney is a visual bonus in this thoughtfully produced show.

All credit to Designer Fergus Dunnet and to Jennie Lööf, Gretchen Maynard-Hahn and Karen Lee-Barron for their gorgeously inventive set, props and transformative  sartorial creations that take us from the lighthouse to the heights of the moon and the depths of the sea with apparent ease.

It must be inferred that the patient, non-threatening nature of the captivating performances leads to the children in the audience being unphased and accepting of the gentle close up interaction,  so full marks to the Tenterhooks team.

Good clowning holds not only the gift of the performer accessing their inner child but of allowing audiences to lose themselves and do the same.  Tenterhooks does this in spades.  Gaggle may be designed with a particular audience in mind but it is of such a standard that it reaches beyond to anyone with a childlike imagination.

Tour continues to:

Tuesday 14th & Wednesday 15th July | Dundee Rep Theatre
Friday 17th July | Rothes Halls, Glenrothes

Further October tour dates to be announced later this year.

Irene Brown