Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples
Little Shop of Horrors
Live Live Cinema, Silo Theatre and Jumpboard Productions
Available at Auckland Arts Festival Online
Until March 27th
Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples
In 1960 Corman produced and directed the cult classic “The Little Shop of Horrors”, about a hapless florist’s assistant who cultivates a plant that feeds on human flesh and blood. The film includes a cameo appearance by Jack Nicholson as masochistic dental patient.
The film employs black comedy with farce, Jewish humour and elements of spoof. The scene with Jack Nicholson adds another dimension as the sequence is set at a dentists – “the murder house” in the popular imagination. In Auckland Festivals Online version directed by Oliver Driver the comic elements are further extended by the four performers on screen alongside the original film.
Byron Coll, Barnie Duncan, Laughton Kora and Hayley Sproull re-voice the characters as well as playing instruments and providing sound effects. The quirky antics of the four performers who are in four different location –lounges, bathroom and kitchen provides another entertaining part of the production. The score composed by Leon Radojkovic is an outstanding example of ingenuity and musical humour.
The way it is presented with the four musicians alongside the film means that the work retains the films original sensibilities, with its sense of the macabre and film noir.
Its a show which would probably have worked well on stage but this digital; format is innovative and pacy with some clever dialogue.
New Zealand Arts Review 