Review: Avenue Q

Puppet and human protagonists come together for black comedy executed with a light heart, says Ewan Waters

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Avenue Q
Palace Theatre, Manchester
6 May 2016

Call it filth. Call it saccharine. Call its plot hardly groundbreaking, but Avenue Q holds up a mirror to contemporary adult life and does so with bucketloads of dark wit and fearlessness.

The story follows the puppet Princeton, a recent college graduate who moves to a ramshackle New York apartment searching for purpose, having acquired a BA in English that has, of course, left him completely jobless (“What do you do with a BA in English?” he chants repeatedly and hopelessly in the opening scene).

Princeton soon discovers that his new neighbours, a mixture of puppet and human protagonists, are also either unfulfilled or harbour lesser ambitions. Kate Monster, for instance, is a teaching assistant who wants to found her own school while Trekkie Monster (a parody of the Sesame Street character, which inspires the show), does not even make it as far as downstairs due to his unquenchable appetite for internet pornography.

The story centres on each character’s sense of emptiness and uncertainty, but it is the songs in particular that make the play a scintillating watch. Everyone’s a Little Bit Racist and The Internet is for Porn particularly pack glittering punches through looking taboo subjects straight in the eye.

Sarah Harlington puppets both the studious Kate Monster and the lascivious Lucy the Slut exquisitely

It is black comedy, but its execution is light-hearted and the puppeteers and their puppets are wonderful. Sarah Harlington puppets both the studious Kate Monster and the lascivious Lucy the Slut exquisitely, switching between the two characters’ voices and their very different personas effortlessly. Richard Lowe is also exceptional, puppeting both Princeton and the closeted republican Rod, with the song If You Were Gay one of the play’s most outstanding moments.

Avenue Q also finds room for a love story or two, with the central one being Princeton falling for the girl next door, Kate Monster. Their relationship pans out with the usual trials and tribulations and is a vbit sappy, but their sex scene, with the puppeteers orchestrating proceedings, is eye-opening, unusual and hilarious.

The use of two TV monitors above the stage is a clever touch, allowing the play to open with a cartoon of Mr Sun heading home to Avenue Q, parodying the introduction to Sesame St.

hey also serve to remind Princeton what he is searching for in the first place: purpose, flashing up the word regularly. Their jumbling of “purpose” into “propose”, with reference to Princeton’s relationship with Kate Monster, is amusing, but there is also a more sinister undercurrent here: his looking up at the monitors, as if looking for life’s answers, functions as a chilling comment on how much of ourselves we invest in television and the internet in contemporary society.

Avenue Q’s resolution – that we are all ultimately somewhat unfulfilled and sometimes struggle with where to go next in life – is slightly convenient and predictable. That said, the razor-sharp lyrics and music written by the show’s creators, Robert Lopez and Jeff Marx, matched by a string of sublime performances from the cast and puppeteers, more than make up for it.

Photo of Sarah-Harlington as Kate Monster and Richard-Lowe as Princeton by Matt Martin Photography

Interact: Responses to Review: Avenue Q

  • Review: Avenue Q – Puppet and human protagonists come together for black comedy executed with a light heart – Ewan Waters' Portfolio
    24 Jun 2018 19:33
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