EDINBURGH 2010: BWW Reviews: THE INCONSIDERATE ABERRATIONS OF BILLY THE KID

To tell you the truth, I'm still not entirely sure how I feel about The Inconsiderate Aberrations of Billy the Kid.

It's not for the faint of heart, and it gives you plenty of prior warning that there's a lot of material which many people would find offensive. Personally, I'm not easily offended so my conflicted feelings aren't the result of the rude and 'inappropriate' material. You have to go in expecting that the whole point of the show is to be rude, shocking and outrageous; at times they accomplish this in a clever way and the writing is very funny, at other times it comes across as rude for the sake of being rude and doesn't really work.

To try and give you an idea of the tone of the show, it starts off with Billy, a young boy, accidentally shooting his mother because he doesn't want to go to school. He then has to hollow out her corpse so that the pizza delivery girl can climb into her skin and try to fool Billy's father into thinking that she is his wife (so that Billy doesn't get in trouble for killing her, obviously). There's also some feminist, lesbian angels who encourage Billy's mum to return to earth (along with her aborted foetus from years ago) and stand up to her unappreciative husband and son. And that's just the half of it.

A strength of the show is the cast who are all completely committed to their roles, however bizarre those roles are. They give strong performances and deliver the material with confidence, which helps to bring out the merits of the writing. The story, though very odd, is paced well and ties up the various threads successfully by the end. There's also a live rock band which contribute positively to the overall feel of the show.

This show won't be for everyone, but generally it does what it aims to do. If you like very dark and outrageous material, you should see this show.

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