By Jessica Taurins
To be transparent – I’ve not seen Rhys Darby in anything other than a few seasons of ‘Our Flag Means Death’, and a few of his smaller film roles – ‘What We Do In the Shadows’, the ‘Jumanji’ remake, and ‘Hunt for the Wilderpeople’.
What I’m saying is, Darby has an incredibly long and incredibly vast performing history, and I’ve seen barely any of it.
And, honestly, that made his show ‘The Legend Returns’ all the more spectacular.
For those who know Darby predominantly as a screen actor, comedic or otherwise, it may surprise you to know that he also does other things. He’s a TV and video game voice actor, a skilled loop station performer (that’s the box where people tap buttons to craft beats and songs on their own), and all-round a bit of a clown – and I mean that in the most positive way.
The moment Darby steps onstage, he’s a rock star. The music blares, he runs onstage in his skinny jeans, and everyone is instantly in love. Then, we’re reminded he’s a giant, dorky goofball with some incredibly powerful and eminently respectable opinions.
‘The Legend Returns’ comes in two halves, almost, and it’s not until the very end that all the loose ends are sewn up. To start, Darby mentions his hatred of AI – the use cases where it steals from creatives to make incomprehensible, ugly artwork, and the way talking to it reduces humanity’s collective IQ – and then meanders into a discussion about the Olympics. Unfortunately, he does not win the medal for entering a room and remembering what you’re intending to do in there.
Keep with me here, it’ll make sense in the end.
Throughout Darby’s performance, he prances about the stage as both storyteller, mime, and sound effects machine. When he flies between two hanging drones – it’ll make sense later – his body practically floats above the stage with the power of his mime, and the wingbeat noises he spits across the stage could almost be mistaken for the real thing.
My understanding of his talent – having only seen him on screen – was expanded instantly as I got to see his show, his performance, all done his way. Everything happening on stage was a product of his strange little brain, and it made it so much more impressive.
The second half of the show continued a little more in the AI theme, with interweaving stories about two household robots and their bewildered owner. It does feel like this ‘half’ of the show – more like 40+ minutes – is a bit less structured, but as the climax of the show comes round it ends satisfyingly all the same. For example, I didn’t much care for the slow-paced rumba story amongst Darby’s other quick bits, but the callback in the show’s final moments made it all worthwhile.
Darby is a seriously talented performer. It’s rare to find triple threats – singer, actor, dancer – who are actually equally skilled in all their chosen fields, but Darby is like an octuple threat as he shimmies across the stage. He acts, he dances, he sings a tiny little bit, he plays a robot and a human at the same time, he crafts a song about New Zealand in his little beatbox machine, he hip thrusts in his tight little jeans and doesn’t even split them open! A man of many, many talents.
If anyone is still on the fence about seeing him, don’t be. It may not be a gay pirate adventure (watch ‘Our Flag Means Death’ on whatever streaming service happens to have it right now!) but Darby’s innate charm and well-practised skills make you believe every second of his car chase between a Cybertruck and a hoverboard.
And you’re just going to have to see him to understand how those elements come together.
