Arts:Blog

Theatre Review: My Left/Right Foot *****

Michael Cox reviews a production that doesn't have a false note.

To be able to satirise and honour a topic at the exact same time is one hell of a trick to pull off that few succeed in—Bird of Paradise and the National Theatre of Scotland’s My Left/Right Foot manages an even greater feat of doing it twice over.

The Kirktoon Players have competed in an amateur dramatic society competition for years but have never won. But when a member comes up with the idea of being inclusive—not to do the right thing but to score extra points at the next competition—the madness kicks off.

My Left/Right Foot has a terrific time lampooning inclusion programmes and policies but celebrates diversity. It also has pleasure in poking fun at the inner politics and soap opera shenanigans that go on in many productions—amateur and professional alike.

And there isn’t a false note in the entire production. The ensemble are uniformly terrific, playing comedy and belting out tunes with aplomb while creating empathetic characters. But the real heroes are the creative team, who between them have managed to write a compelling book and create a number of show-stopping songs that are witty, hilarious and almost always teeter on the thin line between good and bad taste.