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INTRO
In this odd little gem of a show, Hugh Hughes tells us a story from his past, with the help of his cheerful friend Sioned Rowlands and a host of high-tech gadgets, including an overhead projector he found in a skip and his granny’s old wrestling magazines.

REVIEW
Point #1: As a young man Hughes sets out to leave his home, the island of Anglesey, and see the world. At that precise moment, an earthquake strikes. The bridge that joins Anglesey to the rest of Wales collapses, the island released to float freely into the Atlantic. Hughes remains determined to carry out his plan of leaving but gets little sympathy from the other islanders, for whom the crisis only serves to fan the flames of pride in their homeland. It’s a story that resonates strongly with a Tasmanian audience: we did, after all, have our own secessionist movement at one point.

Point #2: The format of this review is related to the format of Floating. Hughes and Rowlands take care to explain exactly what they are doing and why, as though concerned that any confusion or ambiguity might lead the audience to become distressed. They create a theatrical experience that is deliberate and self-referential. They tell us what they’re going to do and then they do it. You could describe it as ‘Brechtian’, if that didn’t sound too serious and political. Perhaps you could just call it earnest and also funny. And yet there's a subtle pathos to the story of a man who tries to leave his home, only to find that it won’t let him.

Point #3: Hugh Hughes is rather a charming fellow - well, at least, this version of him (presumably fictionalised), however close that might be to the real man. This Hugh Hughes is hesitant and mild-mannered and smiles with delight as he talks. He’s kind and polite to his co-performer (“Thanks so much, Sioned, that was brilliant!”) but is capable of being strict with his audience (“Just calm down now”), even heckling unfortunate late-comers and sweet-eaters, long after the point you’d expect him to stop. Perhaps he gets away with being overbearing because he’s so obviously sincere. Actually, he reminds me of Anthony Perkins. If you remember, Norman Bates was actually quite sweet and shy, played with beautiful naturalism for much of the film. He had a lovely smile, and Hughes has a similar smile. No, Hughes doesn’t go ‘psycho’ in Floating, don’t get the wrong end of the stick. But you do sense a sort of tension within him, an unresolved anger. It’s the anger – or perhaps impatience is a better word – that comes from trying to escape his origins and not being able to.

Point #4: In a shocking oversight, the scene where the island of Anglesey says hi to ‘all the other islands of the world’ omits Tasmania. Gasps and angry murmurs could be heard from the seats of Hobart's Playhouse Theatre. A deliberate attempt to provoke, revealing the thematically-relevant parochialism of the audience? Well, I’d like to think so but this is unlikely, given that an earlier scene mentioned a similarity between Wales and Tasmania, both having been left off maps from time to time. It seems Tasmania was simply forgotten!

Point #5: Sioned Rowlands is surprising. At first she seems hardly to be doing anything, really like an amateur, a friend given a part in the show out of loyalty. She moves around the space flicking switches and pointing to maps, picking up props, interjecting helpful remarks, less like an actor than a stagehand overstepping her bounds. But gradually we see that everything Rowlands does is deliberate and, increasingly, very funny. She plays a few characters – Hughes’ beloved grandmother, his frightful primary school headmaster, his dopey friend Gareth – and she does so with tremendous conviction. The relationship between the two performers is, after all, essential to Floating, giving it a warmth it could never had had as a one man show.

CONCLUSION
Floating is an unusual, whimsical and funny evening of theatre. In simplifying its intentions, in laying everything out so clearly and precisely – down to actually giving the measurements of the collapsing bridge as the event is described – it circumvents the usual problem of hiding exposition. The exposition is obvious here, and entertains in its own right. And the act of providing this exposition, of telling a story with care and attention to detail, becomes something noble. To tell the truth is a thing worth attempting; even if, as Hugh Hughes keeps reminding us, our desires influence our memories -- and thus the truth is at best an imperfect recollection.


HoiPolloi in association with Hugh Hughes present
FLOATING

Created & Performed by Hugh Hughes and Sioned Rowlands

LAUNCESTON
Earl Arts Centre, 10 Earl Street
28 March at 2pm & 6pm & 29 March at 6pm

HOBART
Playhouse Theatre, 106 Bathurst Street
2 - 4 April at 8pm, 5 April at 6pm

Duration: 1hr 10mins (No interval)
Tickets: $30, Concession $20
Online Bookings: www.tendaysontheisland.com