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This wilfully silly ‘adaptation’ of HG Wells’s seminal Victorian sci-fi novella is a show of two halves.
The first is solid enough: it begins as a play about putting on a play, familiar ground for both its star Dave Hearn – part of Mischief Theatre, they of ‘The Play That Goes Wrong’, ‘Peter Pan Goes Wrong’, ‘Magic Goes Wrong’ etc – and writer John Nicholson, whose long-running theatre company Peepolykus has been batting out larky post-modern adaptations of classic texts since the ’90s (he co-writes with fellow industry veteran Steven Canny).
Playing what are supposed to be versions of themselves, the cast of Hearn, Amy Revelle and Michael Dylan all hang on to their first names, but Hearn informs us that his surname is actually Wells. He is, he says, the great great grandson of HG Wells and has browbeaten his long-suffering colleagues into ditching their hoary touring version of ‘The Importance of Being Earnest’ and instead replacing it with his own adaption of ‘The Time Machine’ – which he has come to believe to be a factual work based on his ancestor’s own real experiences.
There are some funny bits, most notably a section in which a conversation between Kermit and Miss Piggy is used to try and explain the Hitler paradox of time travel. But it does feel hidebound by genre cliches of plays about people staging plays: not only do the actors bicker incessantly, but their characters in their production of ‘The Time Machine’ bicker incessantly. If bickering is your favourite form of comedy you’re golden, but otherwise it feels a bit one-note.
Really, though, it’s all set up for the second half, which is glorious, as ‘The Time Machine’ morphs into an amusing, witty, imaginative show hinging on actual time travel, as it pivots around a gleefully ridiculous plot twist that totally shifts the focus of the story and, frankly, makes it all a lot more fun.
Orla O’Loughlin’s production also loosens up a lot: there’s no audience interaction in the first half, but in the second there’s loads, with multiple crowd members hauled up on stage, adding a pleasing air of anarchy.
If I had my own time machine I don’t think I’d be so churlish as to skip the first half. But I might treat myself to the second all over again.