If You Like Pina Coladas
Performance with Laura Moreton-Griffiths
Colony Room, 2024
If You Like Pina Coladas, 2024
Dating is not what it used to be.
But Sasha and Laura have high hopes.
They wrote to the paper, took out a personal ad.
Neither’s a poet, but they had to do what they had,
An art show in London, let’s cut through this red tape.
At a bar called the Colony, they plan their escape….
In Rehersal at Laura’s Studio
If You Like Pina Coladas
Was staged within the new Colony Room, a facsimile of the original infamous members club in Soho.
Consciously analogue, set within the parameters of a first date and riffing on the Pina Colada song we jest with the modern app based dating. An elaborate charade of the convoluted pantomime played within a courtship, crossing genders and sexual desires to humorously visualise the facades we all create during courtship. Staged in the round within a bar referencing a somewhat Bacchanalian past, incorporating simple props and costumes and a centre piece ‘seaside cutout’ of an androgenous classical statue.
Acting as stage hands, ushers, performers. We bring the audience in, and using temporary markings on the floor, define the performance space, build the bar, set the props and costumes. The arrangement is all part of the performance. Audience participation starts from the beginning.
The audience, given a prop and even a role, experience a madcap routine of antics, vogueing, courtship and dancing. Prompted to interact with a vocabulary of ooohs and aaaahs, invited to Clap! Louder! And a game of pin the appendage on the statue.
