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The brown word: Death on the Throne @gatehouselondon

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We’re warned at the start of the show with an upbeat number that this is not the usual sort of musical. And it turns out to be just that. But with boundless enthusiasm and energy from its two leads, who deploy a range of voices and breathtaking energy to create a series of voices for puppet characters, a bedtime story becomes a silly oddball tale about four souls stuck in purgatory. With puppets. And various toilet humour references. It’s currently playing at Upstairs At The Gatehouse . The piece starts as a bedtime story. Daddy (Mark Underwood) is about to read a bedtime story for Louise (Sarah Louise Hughes). But her stomach felt funny, and soon, she went to the bathroom. Then, for reasons that seem to only make sense in the confines of the show, they start telling the story of four people who died in unfortunate circumstances in the bathroom. Depicted as puppets, they’re stuck in purgatory as St Peter doesn’t have enough space for each of them in the afterlife. And so begins a puppe...

No small parts: Friend (The One With Gunther) @onewithgunther


Suppose you have neither the time nor the intellect to sit through 236 episodes of Friends on Netflix. In that case, thankfully, writer and performer Brendan Murphy distils the ten seasons into his show, Friend (The One With Gunther), as told by Gunther, that guy who manages the coffee shop.

The coffee shop is where much of the action of the show takes place. It's a strange location that looks like the show's creators couldn't work out whether it should be a bar, a diner or somebody's living room. But as acknowledged here, Gunther was there (albeit more prominently from season two), and so he is the best man to give his view on the goings on. And since the Friends characters always talked so loudly in the coffee shop, he could hear everything.It's part recap and part piss-take. The latter suits if you missed all ten series of the primarily white, often homophobic yet still curiously popular series. 

Murphy takes us back to a different time and place. The nineties. Before smart phones, high-speed internet and not as much choice about what to watch on television. With a series of recaps, audience participation and songs, he covers the ten seasons of Friends. No cliche or supporting character is overlooked as he reimagines the show from the perspective of Gunther. 

Murphy, who was previously in the the hilarious The Crown Dual makes Gunther much more fun here. Particularly when compared to the best of moments you can see on YouTube. But maybe that's because apart from never caring about the show, he's prodding us to think about why certain shows capture the mood of the time. 

Written and performed by Brendan Murphy and directed by Hamish MacDougall, Friend (The One With Gunther) is available to stream on Stream Theatre until the weekend and then available on Demand from next week until the 25 July. Even if you can’t stand watching Friends, it’s worth a look. 

Live shows may be coming (when eventually permitted), and check the website for details.


Photos by Steve Ullathorne


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