This highly physical comedy about two competitive swimmers begins at the beginning – not with a referee’s whistle but a stand-alone aquatic opus racing through humans’ evolution from fish. In caps, goggles and bathing suits, Alexander Burnett and Ellie Whittaker recount our abiding passion for the water, from the earliest forms of life to Napoleon diving into an especially wet misremembering of Waterloo, and on to an amusing pitch for The Great British Swim-Off. It’s a supremely silly sequence that could even withstand a few more laps of absurdity.
The show’s focus, though, is on two contestants going head to head: Meeta (Burnett), drilled for competition since birth, and Steve (Whittaker), rehabilitated from a wayward youth by a newfound love of swimming. (He still has an over-developed right arm from throwing stones.) Meeta emits discipline and icy focus; have-a-go Steve is a bag of nerves, goggle-eyed even without the swim glasses.
In a nice touch, Burnett and Whittaker are competitive with each other about how this story will be told and they also play overly fussy, antagonistic race organisers and buffoonish commentators. As for the other competitors, coaches, lifeguards and so on – they are all played by us, thanks to the most affably handled audience participation I’ve seen this fringe.
With bombastic music from Andrés Hernandez, Olivia Zerphy’s production never treads water and the limber, Lecoq-trained performers are suitably synchronised. Who needs props when they can play gym equipment, a library or a glacier themselves?
This is a genially amusing hour, never quite reaching hysterical heights, but with plenty of clever, goofy touches and a wide appeal (it’s for over-eights) even if the moral could probably be elucidated for younger audiences. The story grows surprisingly sweet and shows there’s more than one way to win in life.
