BWW Reviews: GHETTO KLOWN, Charing Cross Theatre, October 27 2011
By: Carrie Dunn Oct. 29, 2011
Kate Finburg
Listening to someone spill their soul on stage has the potential to be an uncomfortable experience and by John Leguizamo's own admission, his autobiographical show exists to exorcise the pain from his soul.
Ghetto Klown claims to portray its cast of characters and incidents to the best of Leguizamo's memory; however, names have been changed at the behest of his lawyers.
His extraordinary ability to take on a cast of personas who have impacted on his life makes this one-man show at the Charing Cross theatre not only bearable but insightful, funny and heartbreakingly sincere.
Having starred in two of my all-time favourite films (Romeo and Juliet and Moulin Rouge) I was hoping for some juicy morsels from the film sets. And Leguizamo didn't disappoint, describing his audition process for Luhrmann in excruciating detail - he had suffered an injury at the hands of
his former best friend merely hours earlier (a drunken fight over money) which rendered him able to only whistle the lines of Tybalt. However, he was victorious over the other actor up for the part: revealingly, Benicio del Toro.
Some of the stories appear slightly exaggerated and most are acted out with physical comedy (and often dance - he's got some moves) but the clue, I suppose, is in the title of the show - Leguizamo has always played the clown.
The reality is, his upbringing has clearly affected the man he is today and a difficult relationship with his father forms the basis of much of his material - so much so in fact that he was sued by his own family.
Ghetto Klown's clever staging involves Leguizamo interacting with amazing photo and film projections by Aaron Gonzalez which immerse him in the action and move the decades along.
The genuine purging of a man who surely has lived out only half his career in the spotlight so far makes this show worth seeing.
Ghetto Klown runs at the Charing Cross Theatre until 12th November.
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