The hit show from England, ‘Graeme Of Thrones’ presents a loving tribute to television series ‘Game Of Thrones’ and satirises the world of amateur theatre.
‘Graeme Of Thrones’ (30 November at Brisbane Powerhouse) sees a trio of actors attempt to present their re-imagining of the hit HBO series for theatre to an audience of financial backers, which the audience is referred to as throughout.
The trio present their vision of the first season along with examples of scenes reassuring their potential financiers they won’t forget any of the most popular scenes among fans, with a high level of sex and violence remaining intact despite the promise of the show being ‘family-friendly’.
Throughout the show, the cast themselves are overtaken by their egos, battling each other for the spotlight through hilarious pieces of bickering and pretension.
‘Graeme Of Thrones’ doesn’t feel much like a parody of the show. Despite the hilarity of the cast's impressions of characters from the series, there is a genuine love for the characters.
The cast project the most well-known qualities of characters that has fans of the show roaring, from Jon Snow always feeling left out, to Jorah Mormont as a man who carries pain from his crush on a schoolboy’s imagining of Daenerys Targaryen.
While the impressions were entertaining, a whole show of these would have been tiring due to their two-dimensional nature. The show’s addition of an extra storyline of the pompous cast bickering over the direction of the performance provides an extra level of story and hilarity.
Lead actor Graeme is a push-over who isn’t happy with his masterpiece being derailed; Paul is delightfully dumb, with his acting as amateurish as the special effects he inserts, from puppets to hiding behind a redundant green screen; and Bryony wins a lot of laughs due to her desire to be taken seriously as an actress by trying to insert as much of the gritty realism of the show, even though her limited acting abilities make it far from dark.
Scenes including a medley of love ballads performed in Dothraki to a tableau representing a boar’s death, which left piles of chewed-up ham on the stage delivered laughs, but it was when they dived into bad taste which really made the crowd roar.
One in particular saw a creative reinterpretation of Sansa Stark’s first period, which saw over-emotional acting from the big-headed Bryony, and Paul’s creative use of a leaf-blower and confetti hearts.
‘Graeme Of Thrones’ is less a parody of ‘Game Of Thrones’ and more of a satire of the egos which fill amateur theatre. But, like the show it is paying tribute to, it is filled with jealousy, violence and sex, and is just as hilarious as its source material is exciting.
‘Graeme Of Thrones’ played at Wonderland Festival 2016 at Brisbane Powerhouse.
