EdFringe Review: INDY!

On paper, INDY! should be a sure-fire hit. Beloved IP? Check. Expert creative team behind Potted Potter and Buffy Revamped? Check. Tried and tested performers? Check.

Yet, whilst I’m sure this energetic, good-humoured production will pack audiences in throughout this Fringe, I surprised myself by not being a huge fan.

It’s not the peculiarly British mix of silly and wry parody the show runs on; growing up, one of my enduring favourites was the interrupting cow joke.

It’s not the IP; I love the original Indiana Jones trilogy this show mashes rather cleverly together.

Yes, even under Olivier-nominated director Owen Lewis, proceedings could be cleaner and more polished, but it’s a relatively new production, and it’s obvious how much effort has been put in to stage a fun, surprising, and good-looking show.

“Yet, whilst I’m sure this energetic, good-humoured production will pack audiences in throughout this Fringe, I surprised myself by not being a huge fan.“

Don’t get me wrong, it’s an entertaining piece, but I should have enjoyed it more. So why?

High Concept, Predictable Execution

The answer is two-fold. One, if you’re going to take the ‘Goes Wrong’ model of framing your comedy as an amateur production (in this case by a hard-pushed archaeological club), you must stay true to it. INDY! starts promisingly, the on-stage trio breaking character to welcome everyone to their new show, and best hope of keeping their slot in the Church Hall from the grasping hands of the Cubs and Beavers. That device, and all its rich possibilities, all but disintegrates long before the show ends. As they say, ‘Use it, or lose it.’

However, all could be forgiven if writers Daniel Clarkson and Brendan Murphy showed more love to their characters. Instead, we get rather lazy takes on Indiana (Murphy) and his first love interest, Marion (Victoria Blunt). Clarkson himself begins as Raiders of the Lost Ark baddie, Gestapo agent Arnold Toht, but has morphed into a more generic Nazi before long. The talent on the writing team and on stage is capable of much more than simple caricature.

Even so, there’s good invention throughout: the montage in Marion’s mountain bar and their first meeting with Clarkson’s Toht is a particular cracker. The obvious lack of snakes from the top of the show forms the basis for some wonderfully dry lines, whilst there are glimpses of ridiculous brilliance when bringing the Temple of Doom heart-removal scene to life via puppets. Other bits like cart-rides and plane chases are fun, if not reinventing the wheel in a Fringe landscape that contains live cinema comedy experts like Recent Cutbacks. However, comics have been sending up Bond villains and their byzantine execution ideas for years, and Indiana’s enemies are equally ripe for sending up; it’s done well.

Yet at some point the formula becomes too predictable: Indiana will be dumb, Marion will be a bit smarter, the Nazi will be OTT, pitched somewhere between ‘Allo ‘Allo! and Dad’s Army. There will still be some big chuckles, from hat-based puns to the Nazi’s eventual disintegration, but the packed auditorium I sat in, whilst obviously entertained, was in no danger of death by laughter.

In the end, I left feeling I’d seen a pretty solid panto take on Indiana Jones, just without the reworked pop songs and dance routines. Even so, as I said at the start, I expect INDY! to entertain healthy audiences all Fringe-long; it may fall short of greatness, but it’s still a fun ride.