Mime?
Have the Whingers lost their minds?
Is Edinburgh a portal into a strange parallel universe that will see them embrace sung-through-musicals, on stage park benches and balloons-as-metaphors too?
The Boy With Tape On His Face is yet another show that sets out its stall in the clearest of manners.
On stage is a boy who indeed has a piece of gaffer tape stuck across his mouth. So he can’t speak, so, yes, this indeed technically a mime show; “the boy” even wears a stripey T shirt under his jacket.
Yet instead of the usual walking into a strong wind or trapped in a small box kind of mime this is a highly interactive show in which the boy wordlessly persuades audience members to perform all kinds of comedy turns on his behalf.
It feels highly original, is wildly funny and seems like a rather risky venture, relying as it does on the ability of audience members to cotton on to what’s being asked of them.
Sit on an aisle or the front row if you’re brave and you’ll probably end up in the show. The Whingers were over-looked on this occasion but we were due a night off from doing other people’s shows for them. Seek him out: www.theboywithtapeonhisface.com
Rating
A West End Whinger 
Saturday 27 August 2011 at 10:51 am
We saw the boy with tape on his face do a short set last year, where the member of the audience really didn’t cotton on to what was being asked. But even then, the boy made it work really well.