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A small win for the grammar Nazis.

Nottingham’s Royal Concert Hall opened its doors last night and beckoned us in to enjoy an evening of interactive fun and contemporary flouncing about with ‘Aluminum’. From Israel.

We’d somehow wangled complementary tickets (it’s nice to know someone who knows someone who knows someone. I feel like I’ve finally made it.) and got plunked right in the front. We were third row back but had no-one in front of us and were right in the middle. I felt rather exposed. Particularly when the show opened and the performers dutifully trooped out into the audience. It was one of those shows. Audience participation and all that. Jolly hockey-sticks and joining in and let’s all play along and have fun together, why not? Isn’t this exciting?! Hmm.

My initial reaction to the show was one of mild creepiness. The stage was awash with long tubey things like a snakes’ nest which were having air blown through them to make them writhe off the stage and into the audience whilst atmospheric music played. When one of the stage hands ran up and started dragging the tubes about and shoving them in our faces my creepy feeling was replaced by mild trepidation. “Back! Back!” He cried, until we’d managed to pull the things over our heads and further back into the audience. And when we’d finally managed to get them all out the stage hands immediately appeared again to whip them back onto the stage, clunking heads and scrawping faces with abandon. Hmmm.

Next, we were treated to a bit of sock puppetry set to a mash of popular music hits. There were cute bits, but they were sort of crowded out by the general half-arsed nature of the puppetry and the failure for the piece to progress in any way. It stopped eventually and then some big tubular men came out and danced together, with attitude. I think the basic premise of this was that men wearing big metal tubes look rather quirky, particularly when they move with style and aplomb. Or at least, I couldn’t see anything else to read into it. At this point I was experiencing a feeling of subdued expectation. Any minute now, I’m going to be blown away by something fundamentally original and inspiring. Any minute…

Next bit had an industrial-rock style production-line theme to it with four or five performers blowing up balloons, rythmically. Again, this would have been alright in a Stomp kind of way if they’d have expanded on the premise, or given it a bit of umph. Maybe added a bit of dance to it or done something exciting with the balloons. Eventually, however, they just gave up and threw three large silver, square inflatable things out into the audience. Right at our heads. Pete and Tom batted a couple away and spent a while complaining bitterly about their newly broken knuckles. They were the heaviest inflatables in the world. Which somehow sucked all the fun out of playing with them. It was a case of choosing to duck and cover or engage in defensive arm whirling. My overwhelming feeling at the point was one of fear for my physical self.

Then there was a big inflatable puppet man controlled via various performers wielding sticks. They moved him about the stage for a bit and then took him down into the audience and just lay him out across people’s laps. He touched Tom’s willy. I’m guessing that we were supposed to be experiencing their art form on a tactile level with all of this gumph but I wasn’t convinced. Watching your friend being masturbated by a shiny-smooth balloon man doesn’t appear to have much intrinsic artistic worth. Not at first glance, anyway.

And so it went on. Two men came out and shone torches in our faces at one point (‘Daddy, have you seen my flashlight?’) before dragging up a very embarrassed looking man to stand in the middle of the stage and get covered in foil. A lot of people wearing tubes proceeded to dance around the stage a bit and ‘eat’ audience man. It was at this point that my feelings went from mild disappointment to modest discomfort.

And then there was a fashion show. A really long one. And the trouble with sitting at the front with no one in front of you and being quite clearly in the view of all the people on stage was that you couldn’t really express your disappointment. Particularly not when they were trying to make eye contact with you. I found myself nodding and smiling politely, despite myself, as stupid costume after stupid costume was paraded on stage and twirled around in a bit. Some of them were all huge and curly. Some of them were very sleek and shiny. One of them looked like a peacock. Polite, bemused clapping ensued. I couldn’t help but feel like I was missing something here because surely people can’t honestly expect you to pay £20 quid to sit and watch them jump around a bit like grinning bafoons in a variety of funny costumes. It’s not entertaining and I’m pretty sure it’s not arty. So atrocious was this segment in fact that I caught myself thinking ‘Y’know, Peachee would really like this.’ It was that kind of level of pointless, wacky ‘Fun’. My inability to display my dislike just made me feel awkward. I was terrified of appearing like I wasn’t thoroughly enjoying myself and to be honest, I’m pretty sure pity wasn’t the emotion our performers were trying to induce.

Whenever we saw sparks of talent or intrigue or entertainment they were always brief, and generally obscured by unfortunate prop malfunctions or plain poor performance. There was a bit when four women danced around a bit over turbo fans which were keeping silver balls floating in the air, and it had real potential. Particularly when they started jumping through the air streams and catching the balls and such. But one girl couldn’t keep her ball up and it really detracted from what the rest of them were doing. And there was another bit, much like the big inflatable mastabating man, but with a smaller, tinfoil man whose limbs were operated individually by a group of performers. And it was cool for a while, when they had him doing contact with his head, and having to chase it across the stage, and when he was doing handstands and couldn’t work out where his head needed to be, and when he was lying down and tapping and clapping along to the music. But it was full of boring filler, and as soon as something interesting like the contact head thing happened, in a blink of an eye it was over and done with. I just felt like they were missing a trick and failing to persue the right ideas.

And so to the grande finale. More interaction. But this time with big tree chipper/blowy shredder machines full of tin foil which were pointed out at the audience. Lots of oohs and ahhs were forthcoming from the first six or seven rows, but they’d managed to set the machines at such an angle that all the glitzy dazzling stuff they were shooting out got caught up in the lighting rig and rained down, quite spectacularly, right down at the front and nowhere else. And after that a load of tubes were brought out and extended across the length of the seating and promptly sent back over us to the people behind. Who then pushed them forward again, clouting us once more across the backs of our heads. And then there was a bit more whooshy glitz and a bit of dancing and whooping from on stage and a big sheet of tin foil was brought out and waved over the fans so that it went all wiggly and shiny. Very nice, I’m sure. And then, after a final and really genuinely funky bit involving sillouettes of the performers leaping about and making pretty shapes, more tubes! This time falling from the ceiling in a manner suggesting a final curtain coming down. Or not, because half of them failed to drop. Oh. Lights up. Get out.

And my residual feeling is one of disappointment. But disappointment tinged with discomfort. Maybe if the individual performers had had a bit of character, or if they’d thought through their stuff a bit more and evolved some of their ideas, or if they’d just completely skipped all the flouncing and fashion show stuff, or if their dance had had more flair and decision to it, maybe I would have enjoyed myself a lot more. But as it was, I felt like they never really managed to deliver on any of it. My advice, you ask? Well, if you’ve got complementary tickets and a free evening definitely, definitely go see them. It’s certainly an experience. If you’re having to pay £20 a ticket…mneh, not so much, actually.