Potted Potter – A Review

Last night we had the best time at Mirvish’s Potted Potter. This hilarious romp through all 7 Potter books by comedians Daniel Clarkson and Jefferson Turner had us laughing from beginning to end. Being the huge Potter fan that Veronica is, this was one that she would not miss for anything. And we can safely say we’re glad to have seen it.

The Panasonic Theatre isn’t overly large and the leads used the stage and audience to their advantage. We were impressed with not only the program in the form of scrolls we were handed when we walked in but to actually having Turner greet us with a personal handshake as we were seated!

Potted Potter isn’t so much a retelling of all 7 novels in 70 minutes, but a parody of sorts. If you’re expecting a detailed, scene by scene replay then you will be sorely disappointed. What you do have here is a humorous, condensed story highlighting certain scenes from each book for comedic purposes. The two man show sees Jefferson as Harry throughout the bulk of the play while Clarkson plays every other character including Voldemort, Dumbledore, Ron, Hermoine, Hagrid, the entire Weasley family, and Professor Snape. As you can imagine, things get a little hectic on stage from time to time, but that only adds to the humour of it and it all works extremely well.

Clarkson and Turner had us in stitches throughout most of the play with the clever use of props (a Dobby puppet, a stuffed Nagini, and an anti-climactic dragon) and incorporation of audience members for various scenes. The Quidditch match using 2 kids from the audience as seekers was the highlight of the night and had us laughing until tears streamed down our faces. And the icing on top wasn’t the melted chocolate cake Clarkson had smeared all over his face, but was when Veronica got a face full of water squirted at her for being part of the winning Qudditch team.

The show closes with a glorious rendition of “I Will Survive”, aptly rewritten by Voldemort as “I Won’t Survive?”, summing up the last book with a disco-tech flare.

As you can imagine, 70 minutes to get through 7 stories makes for a very quick and energetic performance, a performance that Clarkson and Turner had to repeat for a second showing later in the evening. It’s a lot to take on, you have to give the guys credit. But I guess when you’re as passionate as the fans of the Harry Potter world are, somehow you always magically make it through.

This must see show for any Potter fan runs until March 25, do not miss it.

images from Google images and (c) citygirlscapes