Not to brag (unlike Lord Byron), I have an Honours degree in English Literature and literally studied Lord Byron in a 300 level Romantic Literature paper. I fear this show will give me horrible flashbacks to that lecture theatre, but from the best messy-student room set I’ve ever seen to Aimee Smith’s outrageous drag interpretation of Lord Byron himself (Lord Bi-Ron), this is a fun and poignant show.

Lord Bi-Ron: Mad, Bad & Dangerous follows Nathan (Isaac Thomas), a student at Victoria University of Wellington who has a paper about Lord Byron due tomorrow but hasn’t started (oh God, the flashbacks!). Being a casually super experienced practitioner of dark magic, he therefore resurrects the subject of his essay, Lord Bi-Ron (Aimee Smith), to help him and a wild night ensues.

I really can’t emphasize how natural and believable both the set and Thomas are. I have been in that room (come on, you think an Honours student would have a room as messy as that?), and ‘Nathan’ is a friend of mine. This keeps the audience grounded and is a great counter to Smith’s over-the-top and dramatic performance. While I am pleased the show doesn’t address Nathan’s magical abilities, I do question how a man who has been dead for over 200 years (and don’t realise he is dead at first) can have such an intricate knowledge of The Beegees’ ‘Stayin’ Alive’ to lip sync it upon resurrection.

As the show goes on and more lip syncs occur to modern songs, with Nathan trying to steal the limelight at one point much to Lord Bi-Ron’s disgust, I let this question go. This is an easy fix with Nathan questioning Lord Bi-Ron, and him replying with a snarky comment, as is the entertaining pattern of the show.

Lord Bi-Ron is incredibly self-reflexive in its use of meta-theatre: Nathan comments on Lord Bi-Ron lip syncing, the title of the show appears with a microwave ‘ding!’ as both actors point to the projected image behind them, and after Nathan sings a beautiful rendition of ‘True Colours’, he walks back over to his computer and removes his rainbow-tendril Windows 93 screensaver, saying “I hate my screensaver.” These meta-moments fit in beautifully with the show’s overall theme of reflection, which Nathan does more of than Lord Bi-Ron.

While this theme is touching and incredibly important, Nathan does have to lecture Lord Bi-Ron in the end which is where the show loses a bit of its magic for me. As the show goes through all the women in Lord Bi-Ron’s life, I would have liked to see how his reaction to learning that his daughter Ada Lovelace (whom he really did love but never saw grow up) became one of the most important mathematicians and computer scientists in history. I hoped this potential proud daddy moment would be the cause of defrosting his heart and force him to be more self-aware about his own behaviour towards women. Alas, I’m not entirely sure Lord Bi-Ron ever did become a changed man.

Throughout the show Lord Bi-Ron is obsessed (naturally) with his own fame and his legacy as a poet. Nathan informs him that while his poetry is still around (at least institutionally), his “shitty personality” overrides his poetical prowess. For me, this hits crucially topical questions to mull over: how do we address men artists when some of them do downright despicable, egregious wrongs? Does this implicate their art? Should we discount the art because of the man, even when the art is beautiful? Lord Bi-Ron says yes, but also proposes something else: what if the man reflects and is sincere in trying to atone for his actions? Is he forgiven? Do we welcome him back? The answer to those questions are up to us.

Lord Bi-Ron is funny, with references to other romantic poets you don’t need an Honours degree to get, keeping us engaged the whole time. There are beautiful moments of breath when Nathan is ‘processing’ information which leads to original songs, and star-spangled moments of fabulousness when Lord Bi-Ron is feeling most himself, much to the audience’s delight, including playing a glitter-covered guitar through the audience. The sometimes flirtatious relationship between Lord Bi-Ron and Nathan is a joy to watch with both performers holding their own and giving us a rapturously good night.

P.S. Lord Bi-Ron says he would like to haunt his critics. I’ll probably be able to defend myself with cheap liquor, condoms and my waning postgraduate knowledge of his poetry. But does Nathan have a protective spell for me, just in case? Please give me a call if you do. Thanks! 

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