Only last week I was declaring here that the “wooden, mirrored circular auditorium” of the Spiegeltent – one of the travelling wonders of the theatre world, currently occupying its now-annual spot in George Square, Edinburgh – “could well be the world’s most beautiful theatrical container, as opposed to fixed building.”
Of course Edinburgh at this time of year is full of containers – in one case, literally one, that contains a show called The Container — that aren’t purpose-built auditoriums at all, but spaces from student union bars and sports halls to deconsecrated churches that are pressed into use to become venues. One is always astonished at the resourcefulness of some of the venue managers in finding new nooks and crannies which they open up as venues for hire, and no space is apparently safe: over the years, I have seen rooms at the Assembly Rooms, Pleasance and (this year) the Gilded Balloon, that I used to visit as the respective press offices for those venues, suddenly turned into venues. The Pleasance have, for the past two years, been using empty outdoor space as venues by installing portakabins in those areas, too, that are turned into extremely intimate (and extremely hot) venues.
But there’s rarely anything lovely or lovable (let alone, sometimes, practical or even functional) about these spaces, and it’s a relief to return to the comparative civilisation of “real” theatres after spending some time in Edinburgh. However, on Friday I paid an all-too-infrequent visit to one of London’s most singular and delightful theatrical spaces, the Battersea Barge moored on the Thames towpath between Vauxhall and Battersea Bridges, and was reminded how refreshing non purpose-built spaces can be, too. With the Thames literally lapping at the windows and the barge gently swaying in the river currents while pleasure boats trafficked past, you are simultaneously within the enclosed world of this dinner cabaret setting but also reminded of a world beyond it.
On Friday I saw the last night there for a duo of singers imported from New York, Michael Holland and Karen Mack, whose show Blend-o-matic is a compilation of pop medleys that is literally drawn from a hat: the audience is invited to make selections from a card index on each table that are then put into a hat to be chosen from. It’s a novel way of constructing a show, and Holland and Mack have a rare gift for spontaneous interaction with both the audience and each other that keeps it fresh and newly minted, too.
The only disappointment to an otherwise ship-shape evening, in every sense, was the erratic dinner service. When our dessert still hadn’t arrived after about 45 minutes, I made enquiries after it – and two waiters came in turn to try to take the order again, which had apparently been lost somewhere between them and the kitchen but still took another half an hour to fulfil after that. My partner, in any case, ended up regretting it either way, since it then lay very heavily on him for the rest of the night. So it’s probably best to avoid the food and stick to the (slow) bar service.
