Comedy Festival 2018: Steen Raskopoulos never misses a beat in Stay ★★★★½

STEEN Raskopoulos creates an exceptional, beautifully devised, complex, and near flawless, solo physical theatre piece that yearns for your patronage and demands your complete attention.

THE long walk into the bowels of the Arts Centre will reward you with Steen Raskopoulos’s astounding, 55-minute solo performance, Stay.

Tall and lean, Raskopoulos takes to the small stage, decked in a white t-shirt, Nike tracky dacks and retro sneakers, and we clap along while he busts some serious dance moves. But this entertaining, beguiling little intro is the lull before the coming storm.

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During his performance, Raskopoulos demonstrates exceptional acting, improvisational and physical performance skills that include singing and rap dancing.

Such is Raskopoulos’s consummate skill, that when (disgracefully) 40 per cent of the audience is admitted late, he doesn’t skip a beat, making an improvised quip before moving on. Impressive.

And the narrative begins: what happened on May 26, 2017, demands Raskopoulos (the interrogator) of Raskopoulos (the suspect)?

Steen Raskopoulos is outstanding in Stay.

He shifts seamlessly and quickly between characters: a suspect under interrogation; prison inmates; a psychiatrist who administers a Rorschach test to an audience member; a young boy cruelly turned away from a birthday party; a vampire; a Phoenix (yes, the mythical bird).

Raskopoulos’s parody of At The Movies, in which a priest reviews the latest installment in a well-known science fiction franchise, is hilarious, while another comedy highlight is his depiction of the lead in the fictional movie, The Bad Boy of Yoga.

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It is not until the final breathtaking moments of this outstanding, enthralling theatre piece that the penny drops and Raskopoulos provides sense and context to what first appears shambolic, even absurd.

When he concludes his energetic performance, Raskopoulos is reduced to sweat and tears.

Comedy Festival audiences are unlikely to witness anything bearing the quality and audaciousness of this production. Stay is exceptional: beautifully devised, complex, a near flawless piece of solo physical theatre from a young performer that yearns for your patronage and demands your complete attention.

Steen Raskopoulos, Stay

Arts Centre Melbourne, Playhouse Rehearsal Room, 100 St Kilda Rd, Melbourne, until April 22.

comedyfestival.com.au