Reviewed by:
The List
Review by Jo Laidlaw |
26 February 2024
It’s not often you see a priest with a bubble machine. Why is that? This is, one imagines, exactly the kind of thought that roams through Jeromaia Detto’s seemingly random brain. Mush, the result of that activity, is a triumph. Perfectly billed as ‘a kids show for adults’, it’s a masterclass in silliness, If the thought of yoga, mindfulness and all the rest of it does nothing for your busy brain then you probably need a bit of Detto in your life.
Being this free takes a lot of work, though, particularly in front of a live audience where anything can happen. Detto manages to create enough safety for the audience to express themselves without making anyone feel compromised. He’s then free to deal with the twists and turns of his characters’ inner lives: quite literally in the case of Caterpillar Boy, whose transformation into his chrysalis and subsequent short life as a butterfly provides a series of unforgettable images that will be burned into the audience’s retina for quite some time.
Carefully constructed yet divinely anarchic, this is the opposite of clever-clever cerebral comedy. Instead, it’s an invitation to play, to be silly together; and as adults, how often does that happen? Grab it with both hands.