Camping
Basement Theatre, Lower Greys Ave, Auckland
23/04/2016 - 30/04/2016
NZ International Comedy Festival 2016
Production Details
The Campiest Comedy Show Ever
A THEATRE SHOW FEATURING KURA FORRESTER, CHRIS PARKER, THOMAS SAINSBURY AND BRYNLEY STENT
AS PART OF THE 2016 AUCKLAND INTERNATIONAL COMEDY FESTIVAL
Camping is a camp comedy of the highest order – think Are You Being Served and Keeping Up Appearances directed by John Waters.
Camping follows two couples. Les (Sainsbury) and Fleur (Forrester) are a middle-aged husband-and-wife bored who are as hell with each other. Francis (Chris) and Connie (Brynley) are newly-weds morbidly afraid of intimacy.
The two couples double book a camping lodge in the middle of bloody nowhere. And both refuse to leave… As a storm brews outside, old memories resurface, cat fights ensue, tantrums are thrown and sexual desire bubbles just beneath the surface.
Chris Parker and Thomas Sainsbury have penned an over-the-top melodrama with plenty of theatrical emotions, sexual innuendo and many a camping pun.
CHRIS PARKER has previously delighted audiences in Silo Theatre’s No More Dancing In The Good Room and the 2015 smash, Hudson and Halls. Last year Chris won the International Comedy Festival Best New Comer Award for No More Dancing. He is also a writer and actor in both Funny Girls and Jono and Ben.
KURA FORRESTER wowed audiences last Comedy Festival with her sold out solo show, Tiki Tour. She has previously acted in Taika Waititi’s film, What We Do In The Shadows, the docudrama, Belief, and the hilarious web series, The Adventures of Suzy Boon.
BRYNLEY STENT wrote and acted in TV3’s Funny Girls. She also regularly performs on Jono and Ben. She, along with Chris and Tom, is a regular in Auckland’s premiere improv troupe, Snort.
THOMAS SAINSBURY has been writing and directing theatre in Auckland for the last fifteen years. In 2015 he co-wrote the 2015 Basement Christmas show, Jesus Christ 2 and the Dust Palace Christmas show, Ithaca. He is also one half of the brains behind New Zealand’s premiere comedy dance troupe, Dynamotion. He and Chris also co-wrote and starred in the Watchme.com comedy webseries, Stake Out.
CAMPING DETAILS
DATES: 23rd, 27th, 28th, 29th, 30th APRIL at 10pm
VENUE: The Basement, Lower Greys Ave, Auckland CBD
TICKETS: $18 adults/$15 concessions. $14.40 for the Wednesday Performance.
BOOKINGS: www.iticket.co.nz // 0508 iTicket (484 253)
Theatre , Comedy ,
70 mins
Fantastic Foursome
Review by Nathan Joe 25th Apr 2016
Set in a holiday home where two couples double-book for a honeymoon and an anniversary, the drawing room comedy becomes the primary target for parody in Chris Parker and Thomas Sainsbury’s Camping. It’s like a raunchier version of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf with the serious drama cut out. Even the characters feel like grotesque Kiwi versions of Edward Albee’s counterparts, from the sexually repressed newlyweds played by Chris Parker and Brynley Stent to Thomas Sainsbury and Kura Forrester’s older jaded couple.
It quickly becomes obvious that the title of the play refers less to the setting and more to the entire show as a whole. That the husbands of the play both share repressed homosexual desires is only part of that. In fact, it’s the whole cast who are camping it up in their entire performance style, giving their Kiwi caricatures the fullest commitment even in their most ridiculous moments. [More]
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Cheap laughs, ridicule and an outrageously raunchy conclusion
Review by Nik Smythe 24th Apr 2016
The merry late-night full house of opening-night comedyfest goers is all a-buzz as we chaotically convene – and crack up literally seconds after lights-up at the sight of Tom Sainsbury and Kura Forrester’s amusing retro wigs.
Les (Sainsbury) and his wife Fleur (Forrester) are headed to a remote cabin in the wilderness to celebrate their 20th wedding anniversary. Trouble is it turns out said cabin has been double booked with Francis (Chris Parker) and Connie (Brynley Stent), on their honeymoon.
If they were teenagers we’d expect a horror parody, but since they’re married we’re instead anticipating camp lowbrow innuendo-riddled broad comedy – also because that’s more or less what it says on the tin. We’re not wrong, except ultimately it doesn’t stop at mere innuendo.
The characters are consciously twisted stereotypes: Les the sissy bloke, Fleur the feisty suburban Maori, Francis the so obviously gay sportsman and Connie, the almost-straight but comically libidinous bride. The humour over all is obvious and the performance fairly loose, which seems quite a successful approach to a well lubricated crowd, many of whom have likely already been warmed up by at least one other comedy show earlier in the evening.
Various iconic 70/80s references such as mock cream and DEKA are namechecked early on, however the tale is in fact set present-decade as the presence of smart-phones indicates. With them removed it would transform to a period piece with such natural ease I partly wonder why they didn’t just do that. Making it relatable to the millennials perhaps?
Anyway, it’s worth a bundle of cheap laughs, with no-one’s gender or culture safe from ridicule and an outrageously raunchy conclusion that takes full advantage of being able to continue beyond the legal boundaries of its cousin the Carry-On film.
Copyright © in the review belongs to the reviewer
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