Digital Event
The Greater Manchester Fringe runs throughout July, with performances at various venues around Greater Manchester and online. Once again, I’m going to be reviewing a selection of the productions on offer for this blog, and also for The Festival Show on North Manchester FM.
The next show I saw this year was a digital production, and it was part of the C ARTS strand on this year’s Fringe programme. C ARTS is a curated independent arts programme that delivers work for the Edinburgh Fringe, which is then made available online via streaming throughout the year. Although produced for the Edinburgh Fringe, C ARTS productions are now included on the programmes of other fringe festivals, including the Greater Manchester Fringe.
The production I’m going to be reviewing now is available to stream with a ticket purchase from the Greater Manchester Fringe website throughout the month of July. I’m reviewing Disenchanted: A Cabaret of Twisted Fairy Tales, a performance by Eliane Morel. The radio version of this review will be broadcast on The Festival Show on Friday 29th July, but here’s the blog version…
Disenchanted is a one-woman show (though not a one-character show by any means), written and performed by Eliane Morel. It opens on a title card, telling us we’re in Paris in 1699, and a voiceover introduces us to the salon of Madame d’Aulnoy (played, as all the characters are, by Morel).
There are a good number of digital theatre productions on this year’s GM Fringe programme. Some are part of the C ARTS strand, and some have been produced for the GMF Digital Events strand. I saw three of these productions back-to-back this week, which was a good way to dispel any preconceptions that ‘digital theatre’ is a homogenous thing or that it doesn’t offer endless opportunities for innovation and creativity. The three digital theatre events I saw this week were all very different, not least in the different film formats they used for their productions.
Morel’s Disenchanted is what we might call ‘lockdown theatre’, the sort of digital theatre we saw a lot of in 2020-21. By this I mean, it uses a faux video conference format that is self-conscious about its restrictions. In this case, Morel draws a historical connection to make the ‘lockdown theatre’ format make sense. Paris has been struck by plague, and Madame d’Aulnoy is unable to invite visitors to her salon. She consults the Magic Mirror (also played by Morel, and appearing in split screen) who introduces her to ‘magic’ that will allow her to speak to visitors remotely. It will also allow Madame to ‘swipe down’ on the – presumably – mirror to contact her guests for the evening – all of whom are characters from fairy tales.
I’ve referred to this format as ‘faux’ video conferencing, as of course it isn’t actually recorded on a conference platform. This is a film – performed, recorded, edited – and so when Madame ‘swipes down’, we are actually cutting to a different scene and Morel is able to let her characters interact with one another as a result.
‘Lockdown theatre’ was born of necessity, but it always contained the potential for intervention and innovation. Morel explores this potential through the visual techniques used to enhance the performances, including animation, overlaying, colourful backgrounds and subtitling. The overall effect is a film that, while giving a nod to the social restrictions in which it was created (and a nod to historical parallels to those restrictions), is a rich and enjoyable visual experience that feels complete (i.e. not like we’re missing out on something).
I seem to have said a lot about the format there! I think watching three productions in quick succession – and I will be reviewing the other two shortly as well – really draws your attention to the varied ways performers and companies use the technologies available. That said, I really do need to say something about the actual story of Disenchanted now!
Madame d’Aulnoy has invited five characters from fairy tales to attend her (virtual) salon and tell their story through the medium of song. The Magic Mirror is excited to hear that they will be meeting ‘princes and princesses’, but Madame is quick to disabuse him of this. She has invited minor characters, ones who don’t usually get to tell their tales. The intention, it is clear, is to offer a different perspective on well-known tales. As this is something many other writers have done over the years, I was curious to see whether Morel really could give us something fresh.
And I was not disappointed! There is some real originality in Disenchanted, and some surprising ‘twists’ on the tales.
Our first visitor/performer is Olga, one of Cinderella’s stepsisters. We’re probably on familiar territory here, as there have been a number of retellings of Cinderella from her stepsisters’ perspective over the years. Morel’s Olga is a lively creation though, singing us through her story of poverty, social climbing, jealousy and resentment. The performance is comical, particularly as it ends with a coda explaining that Cinderella and Prince Charming later decided to ‘consciously uncouple’ from the Royal Family and wondering if Prince Charming’s ‘disreputable divorced uncle’ might offer another opportunity for Olga and her sister to marry into royalty after all. But Morel’s character here is also charmingly human. I enjoyed the fact that she avoids rewriting the story to make the ugly sisters the victims of the story, but rather to add context to their circumstances that might explain – if not excuse – their mistreatment of their stepsister. Olga is spiteful and selfish, but she’s also rather engaging in her resilience and ambition (and Cinderella does come off as just as ambitious and self-preserving as her sisters here). It’s hard not to enjoy Olga’s gleeful plan to ‘live the life we choose / In our gigantic shoes!’ at the end of the song.
From here, Morel’s takes get a little less familiar and a lot more surprising. We meet Gertie, the goose liberated by Jack in Jack and the Beanstalk, who sings about ‘going free-range’ and starting a union of golden egg laying fairy tale geese. The unexpected message of her song is that ‘you are the controller of the means of your production’.
Next, we meet Mr Wolf from Little Red Riding Hood who offers us a very different interpretation of events from that story – and it’s this sequence that necessitates the warning that this is not a show for children – that is a lot of fun. And then the final performance is from Sleeping Beauty, the only princess who appears in Disenchanted, who reminds us that, while she is the title character of the story, much of Sleeping Beauty is about things done to the princess, rather than things done by her. In a rather polemic take on the story, Morel reframes Sleeping Beauty’s encounter with Prince Charming as non-consensual molestation (actually, that’s not really reframing it, is it? that’s actually what happens) and has her sing ‘Listen, pal, #MeToo’ before realizing that other fairy tale princesses have endured similar abuse.
For me, though, the absolute highlight of Disenchanted was the character that came between Mr Wolf and Sleeping Beauty. ‘Angelique’ (Morel supplies a name for a usually nameless character) is one of the dead wives of Bluebeard, and she tells her story – and those of Bluebeard’s other victims – in a plaintive song set to the tune of ‘Sway With Me’. It’s a genuinely haunting and moving number, and the effect is heightened by the use of visual editing techniques to overlay and impose multiple faces on screen, reminding us that this is the story of more than one woman. Morel’s make-up here is unsettling – particularly coming immediately after the comical stylings of Mr Wolf – and it’s striking that this is the only character who doesn’t interact with Madame d’Aulnoy or the audience during their appearance.
Morel has an impressively operatic vocal range, which she puts to good use in the performances in Disenchanted, varying the style as the songs and stories require and dipping into more informal tones for comedic or conversational effect. Again, a highlight for me was the ‘Angelique’ number, in which Morel uses her distinctive vocal style to striking effect.
Overall, Disenchanted is a fun cabaret-style story that encourages us to think differently about well-known fairy tales. The way certain themes from Morel’s reimaginings weave together, and the way she incorporates bits of Madame d’Aulnoy’s own biography, give Disenchanted a coherence that makes this show both a cabaret and a narrative in its own right.
I really enjoyed this production of Disenchanted – it worked really well as a piece of digital theatre. I believe that Morel has performed a live version of the show this year as well (in Australia), and I would love to see that version as well. Seeing Morel transform from one character to the next without the aid of video technology would be something to see! Those of us outside Australia may have to wait for this opportunity, but in the meantime, I highly recommend checking out the digital version of this show.
Disenchanted: A Cabaret of Twisted Fairy Tales is available to stream throughout the month of July, as part of the C ARTS strand on this year’s Greater Manchester Fringe programme. For the full programme of Greater Manchester Fringe shows on this year, please visit the festival website.
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