Please Go Hop !
The Border Project

Fowlers Live
2 February, 2005

Murray Bramwell

The Border Project’s absorbing theatre game show Please Go Hop! thrives on fun, wit, frenetic energy, Eighties nostalgia and a very welcome serve of theatrical flair. Taking its name from Plastic Bertrand’s kitsch classic Ca Plane Pour Moi (or maybe the Captain Sensible translation, Jet Boy Jet Girl ) it adroitly brings together improvisation and theatrical set pieces in the random format of a dice and board game.

Directed by Sam Haren and Ingrid Voorendt, the Border Project has developed this show through two previous versions, the first at the 2004 Fringe and later last year at Melbourne’s New Wave Festival. With a four night season at Fowlers Live, Please Go Hop! is looking fresher than ever as the six contestants are marshalled by Game Controller Daniel Koerner and energised by sound designers Andrew Russ and Andrew Howard, DJ Sanjii and lighting designer Christian Donoghue.

The show runs over four one-hour rounds as the players – dressed in workout headbands, Adidas trackies and pastel Converse runners – dance, vogue, bluff and act their way through various tasks. Amber McMahon throws the dice, hops to a space and her task is to play a recognisable tune on a lollypop whistle. Kath Fyffe has to recite, in one minute, the plot of Teen Wolf. She, it turns out, is making it up as she goes along – and Cam Goodall challenges with a surprisingly intact recollection of the early work of Michael J Fox. Paul Reichstein has to recall his least favourite teacher. Alirio Zavarce has to describe his childhood lunchbox (it is a Star Wars one) and Cam comes back to read, complete with punctuation, the achingly moronic lyrics to Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go.

According to the dice, and the whims of the Controller, there are all kinds of modes in which a task has to be performed – Operatic, Hardcore, Manic, Sexy, Heavy and Clumsy and so on – and squares marked Glove Power, Chucky Power and Vader. A favourite excruciation for a wrong answer is to have to wear the Darth Vader headpiece while asking the audience questions on true or false statements (Kath) or dirty dancing (Amber) or for Paul, an exercise I can’t recall that left him in a drenching sweat. The tasks are often physically arduous – David Heinrich leads the imaginary light saber duels, Alirio and Cam do arm wrestling, Paul does fifty sit-ups while enumerating as many things as he can think of that he would like.

With blasts of Eighties pop and movie themes – Indiana Jones, Lucasfilms, Sixteen Candles and so on, Please Go Hop! celebrates for the players, and much of its devoted audience, fond memories not only of teen years but the childhood world of The NeverEnding Story, Rubix cubes, My Little Pony, and Slinkies.

In Please Go Hop!,The Border Project has created a smarter, more ironic version of Theatre Sports. The tasks are funny often, but also provide opportunities for dramatically serious set pieces – Paul recalls, at ten, his ferocious Rambo stage, Alirio talks about growing up in Venezuela, and Cam, tells a story from the dinner table. There is an effortless control of pace and interest and the adjudication from Daniel (“I don’t think so”) Koerner brooks no argument and gives no quarter.

With a format that allows the audience to come and go – although many stayed glued to the proceedings for the whole time – Please Go Hop ! is relaxed while coherent, informal but carefully managed. The performers have excellent focus and performance skills, without which the proceedings would readily become tedious or even collapse. Audiences are already enthusiastically returning to this show and it certainly deserves wider opportunities. By all indications Please Go Hop ! has plenty of legs yet.

Commissioned by The Adelaide Review but not published