Operation Ouch: Apollo Theatre, Shaftesbury Avenue, London 4**** William Russell
OPERATION OUCH
by Chris and Xand Van Tulleken
4**** medical matters for minors
The Apollo Theatre, Shaftesbury Avenue, London W1D 7ES to 6 January 2019
Mon-Sun mornings at 11am & some afternoons. Check with theatre website.
Runs 75 mins No interval.
TICKETS: 0330 333 4809
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Review: William Russell 9 December
Helping the medicine go down
The television duo, Dr Chris and Dr and, have come to their audience with medical matters which kept their very young audience transfixed – lots of poo jokes, some gruesome images like maggots being used to cure infections or the inside of one of their ears – as they explained how the body works and how diseases spread. They produced some pig lungs and inflated them, blew up balloons to show how when one sneezes the germs spread, and sent them flying into the auditorium before getting them hurled back on stage, and generally created all sorts of mayhem. They are twins, one has a beard, almost identical and spar delightfully with Chris being the sensible on, Xandi the anarchic one. They may be TV stars but they know how to cope with a live audience and nobody left for the loo mid performance – always the litmus test for children’s shows - nobody had hysterics when confronted with reality, and when the inevitable seasonal jokes from pantomime were cracked everyone laughed.
It is a model children’s show in that it entertains while it informs and has the added advantage - it probably tells the adults present a thing or two they did not know. The pair arrive in a cardboard ambulance, Dr Chris drinks some chocolate milk wondering whether it might be something else, enter Dr Xand to ask where his diahorrea sample is? Splutter and splat goes Dr Chris. Howls of delight from the audience. But it is, of course, just chocolate milk. And at the end there are lots of things to buy in the foyer for a patently happy audience to insist Mummy and Daddy buy – you have been warned.
This is one visit to the doctor any child and their accompanying adult will be happy to take.
Chris Van Tulleken
Xand Van Tulleken