In a beautiful, gentle opening sequence, three stagehands backstage bring to life a ghostly puppet girl who becomes the occasional observer of their joys and tragedies, and this sets the scene for a fantasy enactment of life behind the scenery.
Whilst opera and ballet and melodrama entertain the 'audience' beyond, we watch the actors, singers and dancers come and go, interact with an impressario and stage manager and choreographer and many other characters. There's clowning, pathos, romance, dance and petty jealousies and hatreds, played out in a world that's just the other side of unreality. With an underlying ripple of humour that can suddenly erupt into uproarious comedy, it's an imagining that draws you in and yet seems voyeuristic too.
Wearing lovingly constructed masks and the most rapid of costume changes, an array of characters are brought vividly to life without a work spoken or facial expression. It's all in the body language.
This is simply brilliant physical comedic drama, and the realisation that the thirty characters we've had come and go are the product of just three performers is a testament to the viruosity, and stamina, they possess. Wonderful.
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