By George Dixon
This year’s International Comedy Festival is full of great entertainment. It’s sometimes overwhelming to decide which ones to select.
One of the most outstanding improvised comedies is Time Lord.I had the pleasure of seeing Time Lord at last year’s Comedy Festival, so I was keen to experience the show again.
One of the most unique aspects of Time Lord is that each storyline and principal character- Doctor, companion and villain- change with each performance; likewise, the location can be anywhere, any place, past, present or future.
Selections are decided by the audience, followed by a short meeting of three writers. Each writer then pitches their story outline with their selection of doctor, companion and villain. The audience votes for each story. The winner is selected.
The scope of elements becomes unlimited, especially when the input comes from the imagination of the audience.
The play chosen for this night was titled “Wild West Llama” with the Llama/s being the villains, set in the American Wild West, around the time of the OK Corral.
Improvising is always a challenge for actors, sometimes with dead spots or hesitations. The Time Lord cast are masters of time and space and time. The writers are exceptional, with a flair of brilliance and crazy twists.
The scrips are fresh, with the performers being completely mad, side-splittingly funny, full of energy and highly in tune with each other.
Not only are they improvising, the writer, at times, will give additional instructions such as “Sing your response”, which happens in a heartbeat, to the delight of the audience.
The Time Lord Impro troupe are so well-tuned that I’m confident that each role is fully interchangeable.
Its stories and humour are universal; you do not have to like Dr Who to enjoy their style of entertainment, with family-friendly productions, children are always very welcome.
The concept, skills and entertainment value are such that Time Lord Impro would never run out of material. The freshness of each production and writing skill lends itself to multiple visits.
This is a complete comedy package that you will want to take a friend to. The only thing is the show you have seen will never be performed again.
Hats off to the extremely skilful and talented cast. Wild West Llama was produced, created and performed by –
Creatives:
Writer: Vicky Kyriakakis.
Music: Matthew Hadgraft.
Lighting/Sound: Patrick Slee.
Cast:
Host: Rob Lloyd.
The Doctor: Jackson Eather.
Companion (Penelope) Chloe Towan.
Supporting Characters and Llama:
Tim Roach, Jaime G. Cerda and David Innes.
Time Lord Impro is a must-experience comedy.
With approximately half the audience having seen a previous production, they are certainly developing a cult following through social media platforms.
The comedy is definitely “Off the wall”, with laugh-your-face-off comedy that keeps on rolling.
