Reviewed Saturday 28th September 2013
Korea's
YEGAM Theatre Company made a return trip to Adelaide for the OzAsia Festival, with a reprise of their production seen at this Festival in 2010 that was originally titled
Jump. Now it is called
Extreme Jump, but still has the same story line, involving an extended family of martial artists and what happens one night when a couple of robbers sneak into their home.
This is not simply a ninety minute martial arts show, however, as physical comedy, based in martial arts moves, is the real basis of this production. The martial arts are, nonetheless, very real, the members of the company being masters of various forms, including Tae-Kwon-Do, Hap-Ki-Do, Security (Bodyguard Martial Arts), and Extreme Martial Arts.
The Adelaide Festival Theatre, the biggest theatre in the Adelaide Festival Centre complex, was packed with people of all ages. Right from the beginning, when an Old Man, Sang-Hun You, bent over and using a walking stick, appears in the audience and makes his way, with difficulty and the help of audience members, up the steps and onto the stage, the laughter is already flowing. We then meet the family: grandfather, Tae-Hun Lee, father,
Yun-Gab Hong, mother, Jeong-Yeon So, daughter, Se-Mi Kim, alcoholic uncle, Jung-Hoon Shin, and son-in-law, Sung-Yul Noh.
Grandfather ensures that the family engage in regular martial arts practice and we see competitive traits coming out, with some hilarious results, particularly when the very drunken uncle gets involved. The beautiful daughter's bespectacled suitor arrives and the terms nerd and wimp immediately spring to mind, but there is more to him than meets the eyes and, very soon, the wedding march is played and he becomes the son-in-law.
Their practice sessions are fast paced, highly energetic, and extremely acrobatic, but go beyond armed and unarmed martial arts to include ballet, break-dancing, slow motion fighting, and even an occasional reference to Psy's "kids playing at horse riding" dance moves from his
Gangnam Style music video. They do not miss a trick in filling every moment with action and fun, including selecting two unsuspecting audience members and having them, each in turn, join in on the sparring.
The two burglars,
Seok-Hoon Gu and Seon Kim, are an ill-matched pair, one competent and one hopelessly inept, effectively a straight man and his comic side kick. They break in at night to rob the family, but they get caught out and the family make it very clear that the two have chosen the worst possible house for a breaking and entering spree. The fight that follows had the audience in fits of laughter, particularly the young children around me who swung between uncontrollable giggling and outright laughter all night.
Added to all of this was some cleverly designed lighting, a great set, and a range of sound effects, some made by the performers and others, with split second timing, added by a very alert sound operator. If you think of all of the "zaps" and "kapows" of a 1970s Batman comic, then you have a good idea what was added to the fight sequences. The sound effects alone brought forth lots of laughs.
At the end of the story the entire cast, as an encore, dropped most of the comedy and showed exactly how amazingly skilled they are which, of course, drew huge applause.
It was clear that bringing this group back for a return season was a very good move on the part of the Festival Director, Jacinta Thompson, with the audience leaving the performance with big smiles on their faces.
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