Cleft Pigeon and the Black Hole of Truth
Cleft Pigeon and the Black Hole of Truth told the story of Cleft Pigeon, a self obsessed Teacher’s Aid with delusions of importance. As a result of prank he found a black hole grafted to his belly button. After sucking in various people and objects into the vortex he followed them into the blackness. Cleft had to undertake a confronting and unpleasant journey through his own soul if he was to escape.
The theme of the show seemed to indicate that this would be a humorous analysis of one’s soul and it did occasionally hint at deeper meaning (such as the “pigeon”-like behaviour of the devil character), but these ideas were usually only mentioned in passing and weren’t given adequate explanation. If you were looking for insight into the human condition you would have a difficult time making sense of all that was going on. A few moments of dialog fumbling by the cast only confused matters more. This all led to a lack of closure at the finale.
Most of the characters in this universe were either grotesque or not particularly well formed, making it difficult to empathise with them. The characters that did shine were only minor players in the tale but they were eccentric enough to make a lasting impression.
With this show being primarily a comedy piece, a great many laughs were to be found. Fans of catchphrase driven humour would enjoy the many colourful insults spouted by “Shades McMahon” but the high repetition of this quickly grew tedious. A great deal of the show seemed to be wacky for the sake of it but there were a number of inspired bits of lunacy which were strangely compelling and inventive. The show was filled with plenty of surreal lines and plot points, but these moments were so inexplicably bizarre that they shone. The script poked at the fourth wall a couple of times but this was more clever than amusing.
The cast attacked the material with great enthusiasm. Dave Kenyon handled Cleft with appropriate smugness while the others regularly switched personas and costumes to introduce many different strange characters. The sound, music and lighting effects punctuated the action effectively to engulf us in this strange universe. The set seemed to be that of Cleft’s soul but the lack of interaction with it made it slightly irrelevant, a blank background could have done the job just as well.
The script tried its best to steer clear of many obvious paths to humour that have been covered in similar shows such as episodes of Red Dwarf and Herman’s Head. While some may have seen this as missed opportunities, others would applaud them for taking the path less travelled as some of it actually delivered the laughs. With so many ideas packed into the hour and the surrealist tone, it definitely wasn’t a predictable show.
If you can avoid looking beneath the surface for insight, overlook plot holes and allow the silliness envelope you, an enjoyable time can be had.
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