The Snow Goes On
Bare knuckle pugilist Tom Cribb endured much for the sake of his art but even he might have thrown in the towel faced with the might of West End Christmas shoppers, I reflected as reviewers Frida and Woody and I fortified ourselves in the pub that bears his name, write Woody, Frida and Ed Gray.
A merry crowd was gathering opposite at the Harold Pinter Theatre, which also illuminated the name of another legendary character.
Slava is in town, complete with his troop of fellow performers and their SnowShow. This is my third SnowShow in as many decades, and I want to see if it lives up to the memories that have never melted away.
Train whistles blow in the soundscape that awaits us within this beautiful Victorian theatre where we are to enjoy a work of absurdist genius Slava where imaginations are untethered and we share the dreams of children once more. Our guide into this fantasy world is Russian performer Slava Polunin’s and his yellow-clad clown who appears alone onstage clutching a noose.
Each movement is so beautifully choreographed to the soundtrack that the audience falls under Slava’s spell immediately. At the end of the rope he finds a younger clown, Artem Zhimo. Both are equally bewildered but accepting of their circumstances. Mr Pinter and his good friend Mr Beckett would have very much enjoyed this moment.
There is such tenderness between the performers as they play with balloons and gently tease the audience that SnowShow moistens the eye as much as it gladdens the heart. In the interval a clown passes me an umbrella and promptly funnels a snowball of tissue paper snow down my rollneck, ‘You got stuffed!’, Frida points at me, laughing uncontrollably. Just as in life itself, and echoed in our dreams, things happen for no conceivable reason, nonsense is prized above sense and Slava’s realm really is the stuff that dreams are made of. A sparkly lady flies by on a swing and disappears. A phone call between lovers, both played by Slava, has us in hysterics and then leads to a mime scene that is an unforgettably poetic moment of theatre. A lost love is brought to life in such a powerfully emotional way that Frida sits on the edge of her seat, eyes wide open, mouthing ‘How did they do that?’.
The visual imagery is stunning throughout, and the production is lit so beautifully that the wonderment continues to a crescendo blizzard scene that blasted the audience away in the stalls. The beauty of SnowShow is that it works visually from every part of the theatre and although audience members higher up on the balcony experience the drama in a different way it’s just as special.
Slava likes to sit and silently watch his audience at the show’s end: ‘I lend my ear to the breaths, the rhythms, the sighs of delight and of sorrow that dwell there,’ he says. Everyone wants a selfie and Slava perches on the stage beaming back his bemused twinkly smile. We wrap up our love in gifts, perhaps it’s easier than words, but the buttons will fall off and our presents will shrink in time. Slava’s SnowShow is a gift that stays because Slava Polunin lives within everyone who meets him – playful regretful, naïve, bewildered, full of love and longing, spontaneous and alive in the present.
Back home, Woody proudly brings me a cardboard box from a recently arrived Christmas gift, now hidden away for the big day. ‘Look Dad, a box of snow!’ He’s filled the box with all the ‘snow’ he somehow managed to retrieve from the ‘blizzard’ and stuff into his grey school trouser pockets. I reach my hand into the box to touch Slava’s snow, and the show goes on.
Harold Pinter Theatre until January 12th.
Booking: https://www.atgtickets.com/shows/slavas-snowshow/harold-pinter-theatre/
