The Guru
Letting Go Of Our Inner Bitches
Higher Ground
Tues 13 March
Until Sat 24 March


Symbolically the massing crowd ascended for some enlightenment, Fringe style. Local comic and multi artist Seb Carboncini is the fey - with a thick veneer of sleaze - Guru Vindalooratfried Yummi who sports a bad wig and neck brace from an auto-fellating yoga incident.

The packed house was ready for some laughs parodying the new age sham. What we got was a meditation on letting go, letting rip with a mix of scatological humour and absurdist juxtaposition as the Guru's meditative mantras urged us to let go of everything from poo to vegetables while mesmerised by a weird and wonderful series of images. The idea was, of course, taken further than taste or decency allows, and the audience lapped it up.

Guru then opened himself up to the audience, taking questions from the floor that more often than not ended with an offer of a 'private consultation'.

The mixture of images was the winning aspect of the show. Staged shots of our protagonist in various guises, random people looking ugly or unfortunate or totally content, marvellous altered dolls, European streetscapes all set to the soft, repetitive tones of the Guru asking us to let go of everything, which is necessary to ultimately let go of our inner bitches.

The Guru and 'Letting Go Of Our Inner Bitches' is a great concept that could be taken a lot further. The new age movement is ripe for the picking, and I expect Carboncini will make much more of the guru character as the ten date season progresses. The over full preview audience, upstairs in the Projection room at Higher Ground, was filled with laughter, and so the only way is up!

Narelle Walker