The Malcolm Galea-Chris Dingli-Wesley Ellul trio has done it again. The third edition of Dingle Bells Malcolm Smells: Secret of the Floppadong has been a box-office success as big as its two predecessors.
The trio should move closer to commedia dell’arte, with its fairly elaborate scenarios
It is a kind of panto strictly for adults and shorn entirely of panto trappings – no gaudy and grotesque costumes, no elaborate scenery, and a guitar instead of a band.
I nearly forgot – no lovely girls and sexy dancers; indeed, no girls at all. The exceptions to this last on the night I saw the show were two young women from the audience who clearly thought they were being brave and with-it when they agreed, panto style, to fill a minor spot in the show.
In style and structure, this one was very similar to the first edition, first performed in 2010, and probably to the second one which I did not see. It relies heavily on improvisation by the actors, Malcolm Galea and Chris Dingli mainly, based on a simple situation developed with the aleatory aid of sentences or phrases (smutty, mostly) written by members of the audience, which at one point are scattered on the stage, picked up at random, read out by the actors and then followed up or not in developing the plot.
In addition, the audience is invited to participate by shouting out words or phrases which the actors follow up, even if they are as ridiculous as the suggestion of a paper clip as an instrument of murder.
This technique was much to the liking of the predominantly young audience that included one or two females with singularly smutty minds, but I found it became tedious after a while.
Perhaps the trio should move closer to commedia dell’arte, with its fairly elaborate scenarios and reliance on the actors’ improvisation rather than on the anarchic minds of an entire audience.
The show begins by introducing the two actors, with an emphasis on Dingli, a professional actor who, like many others, has to do all sorts of work when he is ‘resting’. What job will he be given now? Following an audience suggestion, on the night I saw the show, he is to be a plumber, but he is advised to consult a fortune-teller who turns out to be Galea with a shawl on his head and who, to the audience’s amusement and Dingli’s utter puzzlement, can speak in a strange tongue that sounds, and certainly is, utter gibberish.
The interview lasts some 15 minutes, with the audience roaring as Galea tries hard, sometimes unsuccessfully, to produce some more convincing gibberish. By what must be a miracle, Dingli finally understands that the fortune-teller is telling him he will eventually be murdered.
It is not easy to remember all, or even most of the scenes that make up the show. One that certainly sticks in the mind is that of Dingli sitting down, playing a guitar and singing a ballad about his agonising problem in deciding which of two women he is to choose.
The faces of the two women are projected on a screen, and they bear a great resemblance to two prominent politicians, the current PM and the Leader of the Opposition. Now, one understands why Dingli is agonising so much over the matter.
Naturally, the politician who has become the pet aversion of many people, Franco Debono, gets a mention at one point. Of course, it is most unflattering, most readers will be relieved to learn.
The show keeps going and manages to keep the audience interested most of the time, because of the two actors’ improvisation skills and great good humour even when faced with an audience suggestion that is not easy to follow. The two are good friends off-stage, and this shows in the way they play off each other.
I am not sure how much Ellul’s direction can be detected in the performance, but I presume at least that he has had much ado in getting the scenes followed in a reasonably satisfactory sequence.
Dingle Bells Malcolm Smells: Secret of the Floppadong shows tonight at St James Cavalier, Valletta, at 8pm and 10pm.