Review: AMBERGRIS, Barbican

What happens after Captain Ahab is swallowed by Moby Dick? What if, down in the belly of the White Whale, he meets Jonah who just happens to also have been swallowed by the beast?

Ambergris pits the Jonah and Ahab stories together in what is another moodboard show, one that throws ideas together to see what sticks. This seems an obvious idea given that not many figures from literature are swallowed by whales, but French theatre company Les Antliaclastes defy any expectations. It’s only January but Ambergris will no doubt be a contender for the most bonkers show of the year with their slippery fusion of puppetry, masks mime and the macabre.

There is little resembling a narrative, best mull over Melville and brush up on your Bible beforehand. But the rich and slippery imagery lends Ambergris a curious charm nonetheless.

Somewhere between carnivalesque and gothic, it exudes the creepy macabre of a Guillermo Del Toro film. It describes itself as “an alchemical puppet operetta,” and is definitely the sort of thing you might find in the dark corner of a Victorian circus. The puppet Jonah is particularly nightmarish. Its human skull for a head and blinking beady eyes jangle about with such humanity you’d think the thing was possessed.

As playful as the production is it can’t quite convince us of its dark whimsical logic. From Jonah we get whales. Whales, Moby Dick. Mock Dick, Gregory Peck. Whales also ambergris. Ambergris therefore perfume. Perfume therefore a giant dancing nose.

A David Attenborough-like voice over explains that ambergris, a vital ingredient in perfume, forms from the congealed innards of dead whales. The production runs with the idea. A performer with a mask of a giant nose pops out of the set, which is a cavernous box resembling a perfumery. Flowers pop up from glowing vials around them.

Just when you think the play is lost in a surreal mess, Ambergris almost magically summons an emotional gut punch. Ahab, crowned with an oversized Gregory Peck head, finds himself hunched in the belly of the whale alone with puppet Jonah. Destitute, he slumps with his peg leg, hunched and depressed until a miniature whale pops up out of nowhere to bite off Jonah’s leg. Why in amongst the deliciously eerie atmosphere, is it so moving to see Ahab carefully carve a miniature replacement leg for his puppet friend?

Ambergris’s zealous dedication to running with its ideas is admirable and Karine Dumont’s sound designer is a masterclass is how to conjure atmosphere. Even if it doesn’t have the solid narrative to give it weight, sit back and let the sinister aura crawl over you and burrow beneath your skin.

Ambergris plays at the Barbican until 27 January

Photo credit: Jess Lefranc

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