 |
 |
I Spied...True Confessions of an Ex-ASIO Spy Dave Callan Cinema, Fringehub Feb 21 - Mar 13 This is good fun. Take an aspiring actor, ASIO and a keen sense of the absurd and you have Callan's skewed and often acid filled recollections of his time with our keeper of the gates. This is storytelling stand up - some one liners and some nice return jokes, like the ancient guards employed to protect ASIO's building in Canberra. Beneath the jokes Dave Callan had much invested in this thankless job for some seven years. He is short on detail towards the end of his time with ASIO and one gets the feeling he's still a bit sensitive (not unsurprisingly) about his forced resignation. The mood swung from hilarity to pathos at times, which is the call sign of a good actor. From volunteering for terrorism exercises aboard grounded planes to producing the internal newsletter, Callan's stories had the ring of truth that only a maverick would dare to voice. Debunking the 007 myth of fast cars, wonderful gadgetry and double barrelled women, Callan takes us into the day to day office environment, from being the only government office with a smoking balcony (you couldn't stand out the front and smoke!) to the nicknames and acronyms that must abound within an organisation where secrecy is paramount; perhaps somebody should have told the architects not to label the building. Callan succinctly summarises the world's and Intelligence Agency problems with the jaunty final ditty, 'Let's all blame God'. Callan sometimes seemed to lose his place, perhaps distracted by his frenetic pace of storytelling, and the show is well written though a bit loose in parts. Had this been pure stand up there wouldn't be a problem with the venue because he would always be, well, standing up. As it was I lost sight of him every time he sat in a chair, since the raking in the cinema was not adequate. I Spied... is a terrific example of observational humour with which Callan points out the anomalies and absurdities intrinsic to government and policy. It is a unique experiential show, one that offers an insight into the machinations of Intelligence. A rollicking good time.  |
|
The latest issue available now!     |
All content copyright dB Magazine