Death on the Throne – The Loosical by Mark Underwood and Tobias Kunzel. Upstaits at the Gatehouse,Highgate Village, London N6 to 13 April, 1☆. Review: William Russell.

Photo Credit: Ana Barthel.

Death on the Throne – The Loosical by Mark Underwood and Tobias Kunzel. Upstaits at the Gatehouse,Highgate Village, London N6 to 13 April,

1☆. Review: William Russell.

“Louiscal loosical.”

Why one star? Well the cast turned up, the band played well, the puppeteers were adept and Mark Underwood and Sarah Louise Hughes sang well and demonstrated considerable versatility, Maybe in German, from whence it came, it was all very funny but here ninety minutes of lavatorial humour palled about two minutes in and by the end one was left feeling that there were two words to sum it up, both four letters ones – I leave it to you to decide. It really is sloppy – in Germany maybe jokes about Erich Honecker work but here it is sadly a case now of who he? Now had it been Angela Merkel it could have been another matter. Underwood is Daddy who has to tell a bedtime story to his constipated daughter Louise who sits on the throne while he begins, although as they both play all sorts of other characters they are forever hurtling about the place while the puppeteers perform various characters from the story. Four persons performed by the puppets have died on the throne and arrived at the pearly gates to meet St Peter who informs them there is only room for three – who will survive? To their aid come the likes of Elvis and the aforesaid Honecker who was the leader of the former German Democratic Republic. The opening chorus urges us - “don't expect too much” and never have truer words been uttered on the Gatehouse stage. The lavatory jokes spill out profusely, Margaret Thatcher and the Queen appear, and St Peter is called StP – they even crack that one. It has to be said that Underwood and Hughes, who provide all the voices, do so with considerable style, and the puppeteers manipulate the puppets so that they do appear to be singing. Toilet paper gets tossed about, there are several loos on hand which get sat on and a large loo seat for characters to perform behind looms over the stage. Kunzel, a pop-rock star in Germany, plays the drums in the band. It arguably is toe-tapping – the tunes are well performed – but claiming it is going to be “anything but bog standard” is pushing it, which is what Louise was doing while on that throne. It is not so much loosical as lousical.

Cast

Mark Underwood – Daddy

Sarah Louise Hughes – Louise

Louise Nowitzki, Lars Frank, Simon Buchegger, Hannah Elischer – the puppets

Creatives

Director – Blair Anderson.

Set & Costume Designer – Angela Baumgart

Puppet Designer & Builder – Louise Nowitzki

Lighting Designer – Tyler Forward

Sound Designer – Mathias Schroeter

Musical Directors – Michael Kuhn & Tobias Kunzel

Musicians – Oliver Nelken, Gon von Zola