ED2015 2/5 Reviews ED2015 Theatre Reviews

A Divine Comedy (Mike Maran Productions)

By Sarah Murphy | Published on Saturday 29 August 2015

Performing Dante’s ‘Divine Comedy’ with one cast member and some toga-wearing puppets is no mean feat. As an audience, we’d expect a fairly ironic tone, some tongue-in-cheek acknowledgement of the sheer impossibility of the task. So we humoured Mike Maran’s self-deprecating, bookish act – “I’ll cut the script down,” he repeats, “it’s far too long as it is”. But the persistent rambles and anticlimaxes of the script just couldn’t withstand a two-hour show. When a moment of passion finally arrived, it was two hours too late, ringing schmaltzy rather than sincere – I almost wished he had just sustained his downbeat tone until the end. This well-meaning anti-drama was lacking in Dante-esque spirit, and sadly failed to captivate.

Valvona & Crolla, until 30 Aug.
tw rating 2/5 | [Sarah Murphy]