Review: Political farce is a tour de force

Intellectual farce is on offer at the Criterion Theatre this week with this play by Dario Fo, the Italian winner of the 1997 Nobel Prize for Literature.

This translated play needed a strong cast capable of not only high velocity verbal gymnastics, but also strong physical talents - not least the ability to ‘dad-dance’ and throw in a few rather stylish shapes to hits from The Specials and Welcome to the House of Fun from Madness.

Naturally the Criterion doesn’t disappoint.

The farce was inspired by the real death, accidental or otherwise, of an Italian anarchist at the end of the 1960s and goes on to mock the abuse of power by those in authority the world over.

But are scapegoats and long-drawn out public inquiries a necessary evil?

Do perceived ‘enemies’ of the state have to end up falling out of windows to preserve some level of law and order? Even the man playing ‘The Maniac’ points out there could well be more undercover policemen in anarchist groups than the anarchist themselves.

And David Butler, who is The Maniac, is a force to be reckoned with in what could easily have turned into a one-man show - except for the excellent support offered by Rebecca Fenlon (the inspector), Chris Firth (superintendent) and Hugh Sorrill, the hapless Bertozzo.

And that’s before we meet Anne-Marie Greene, transformed into a red-headed Rebekah Brooks style journalist, Riley Powell as the young constable who hardly gets a word in and Frances Dixon, who has to utter a rather rude word in her first appearance on stage in years.

But it’s David Butler’s performance, directed by his father Bill Butler, that leaves the audience speechless in admiration - before they collectively burst into spontaneous hysterics.

Littered with local and national references, some of them more confortable than others, this is farce, but not as we know it in this country. Just a million times better.

Barbara Goulden