Planet Caramel @ Free Fringe, Bar Bados Complex
Planet Caramel are fun and fast
"There are three boys on stage. This is deliberate.” That opening narration sets the stage for Planet Caramel – these are boys, not men, essentially playing with their toys, picking up and dropping sketches at lightning speed. Alex Harwood, David Blair and Richard Duffy are well-matched in acting ability, commitment and timing. They are having fun, and most of the time, so does their audience.
There’s a sense that they’ve thrown everything at the wall to see what sticks, and still kept some of what didn’t. But there’s a lot of invention visible in what they’ve put together. Clever wordplay underpins some of their quickest sketches, including a marvellous twist on a bag for life, although a play on The Weakest Link is, without irony, the weakest of the bunch. Some of the prop gags are brilliant, and manage to pull out more than one punchline in a show that suffers from too many one-joke sketches. There are a few good callbacks, but a couple more would reward the audience and give the show some semblance of structure.
The group do well to deal with unforeseen events, such as latecomers breaking down the door to get in, although such is the chaotic quickfire nature of the show that it almost seems part of the action. Their final gag loses some of the crowd, but they seem to know that – they’re having a blast.