Review: Hold on to Your Butts (Pleasance Courtyard)

Dinosaur parody is a roaring good time

It’s not often that a limited budget works in a show’s favour. Usually, if you are putting on a Fringe show, your prerogative is to tell a simple, contained story, within an hour, and avoid features which take up a lot of space like, say, dinosaurs. But Recent Cutbacks have no such intentions with Hold On to Your Butts, a shot-by-shot parody of the beloved Spielberg classic, Jurassic Park. With a cast of two plus a live foley artist, they reduce and recreate the family thriller with everyday props, subtle outfit changes, and a whole lot of creativity.

Photo Credit: JT Anderson

From the moment the lights go down the jokes begin and do not stop. We have helicopters created from umbrellas, a T-Rex created from traffic cones, Jeff Goldbloom in a provocatively buttoned shirt, and Samuel L. Jackson except every time we see him he adds another cigarette to his mouth. The mile-an-hour Airplane!-style comedy barely gives you a chance to catch your breath and inadvertently prompts applause after every scene. It rewards familiarity with the film: since it is shot-for-shot (or as close to it as achievable in an hour) some jokes only work if you know the scene and recognise what is being replicated. The foley table is perhaps more comedic than realistic but the results are hilarious, including an inordinately long (and suspiciously sloppy) sandwich-making scene.

Photo Credit: JT Anderson

It is remarkable that the whole show is essentially the same joke for an hour straight – here’s something that looks like a shot from the film except it’s small and cheap. And yet, not only does it work as entertainment, but it draws loving parallels between theatre and film as art forms. There is an unspoken respect for everything that film pulls off in narrative and spectacle, but it is also a showcase of what can be made with the restrictions of live performance. To watch a recording of Hold on to Your Butts would not be nearly as entertaining as being there in person; everything exciting about it comes down to the risk of mistakes, the tangibility of the props, and the presence of the performers. The pared-down hour-long adaptation of a famous movie is a beloved formula – but that doesn’t mean it’s easy. It takes imagination, superb comic timing, and a love for the source material – and Recent Cutbacks have that in buckets. These are clearly accomplished performers and theatremakers – thank god they put all their talents into being silly. Four stars.

Hold on to Your Butts will play at 14:00 at Pleasance Courtyard until the 26th of August