The Right Size, Baldy Hopkins

Review in Issue 6-2 | Summer 1994

In reference to British audiences, Right Size founder, and director of Baldy Hopkins, Hamish McColl observed that, ‘They still have the idea of going to the theatre and sitting there being very proper. It's very difficult for them to enter into a sense of the ridiculous. They tend to sit there with their chins in their hands and want to know what it's all about, and are disappointed when it doesn't mean anything.’

Well, yes. The story of five neighbours who share a sub-divided house, Baldy Hopkins is certainly performed with consummate skill. After a series of visual gags engineered around extraordinarily ingenious manoeuvrings of the props and the set, a narrative concerning the hidden treacherousness of the acquaintances which surround one in everyday life begins to unfold. The Right Size have been compared to Harold Lloyd and Charlie Chaplin because of the mix of pathos and humour which their style of slapstick can provoke. But unlike Lloyd and Chaplin, the humour and pathos seem ultimately pointless, and one leaves with a rather hollow feeling. Despite some keenly observed performances the whole is rather less than the sum of its parts.

Presenting Artists
Presenting Venue
Date Seen
  1. Apr 1994

This article in the magazine

Issue 6-2
p. 19