It’s a mad, mad, mad Max Brenner: Jewry Road
Oliver Moore and Ellie Rogers review the 2016 Jew Revue
Any night that begins with a theatre attendant angrily asking us ‘what Jew are you’ (because there are two Jewish themed shows hosted at the same theatre) is a night not to miss.
With energetic performances from a capable and dynamic cast, Jew Revue was everything to love about student revues. It was a perfect blend of physical comedy (Jeromaia Giuseppe Detto and Luke Tisher literally just eating hot chillies onstage), impressive acting chops (the sheer commitment to Clown Dad was frankly stunning), and good old classic shitposts (special mention to Again, St Malaria for being the underrated joke of the night).
Stand out performances came from Emma Balfour as the vengeful old lady who swallowed a fly, Jeromaia Guiseppe Detto narrating through song the decline of his monogamous relationship and subsequent turn to a life of crime in “Mambo Number 1”, and Jestika Chand and Aidan Molins as affectionate co-presenters of ‘Dude, No’’.
No revue would be complete without video sketches, and Jew Revue’s incredible reimagining of Zoolander directed by Wes Anderson was a sure-fire crowd pleaser, thanks to self-titled ‘video mum’ and ‘video dad,’ Balfour and Tisher.
Similarly, no revue would be complete without the intimidating heckling of Ominous James, the overhead speaker ‘eliminating’ actors and audience members as they left for intermission. We stayed for the entire skit and didn’t get heckled once which was only mildly disappointing.
The jokes most lost on the crowd were the ones that tended towards the political, thought perhaps this is a necessary feature of any student production. Lyrics were also lost to much louder musical accompaniment, unfortunately meaning we couldn’t hear most of what we assume is an incredible Hamilton parody in ’Potential Commandments’.
The performance of the night was an attempt, via time machine to assassinate baby Hitler, featuring the acting debut of an adorable actual infant child, perhaps rivalled only by the boy trapped in a dog’s body giving his Bar Mitzvah speech. The fact that the two stand-out performances were carried by non-cast members should not discourage a hilarious and talented cast.
With a zippy throughline of time-travelling scientists and blaster-wielding time cops, the whole show came together in a moment of genuine affection from the audience and performers as we applauded to reverse time and bring back Mambo’s son, a diamond-moment in 540kg of sand.
