Echoes of Nüwa: The Last Human Project @ theSpace Triplex

Gabriel’s Fringe Survival Tips #3: Make an effort to see shows before lunchtime; it is comparatively a very low-stress experience and you will absolutely make the performer’s day. 

Echoes of Nüwa: The Last Human Project is a show about the Muddy Lolos, minions of a creation goddess, set with the task of creatively rebooting humanity so it doesn’t annihilate itself with, y’know, all the wars and climates and stuff. This suggests that it’s going to contain at least some level of virtue-signalling: this is certainly not the case. While the show does ask about the correlation between survival and virtues (the Lolos’ answer may surprise you), it is primarily a batshit romp through what happens when gods with self-doubt and few critical-thinking skills try to recreate humanity in a celestial basin. 

Chia-Yi Chan, Jinyu Dan and Qianyi Wang are the Muddy Lolos, flipping quickly between chorus, solo, human and god with ease, and with nice comic timing. Their performances carry the show forward, as some other elements are less than smashing: the staging is a bit rough-and-ready, and some of the props could have done with more thought – although the strip lighting inside the (ahem) basin was a great touch.

What surprised me – despite its apocalyptic themes – was the frequent swearing and infrequent sex references. It’s (probably) totally OK to bring children to this show. Ultimately it’s up to you how innocent you want your children to be – and if you want to explain to them the etymology of ‘shit’. But even if you’re a proper grownup, there’s a lot of fascinating stuff in here about the right of leaders, the rights of humans and how to be a human, all expressed in an acrobatically zany story to enjoy with your hangover.

---

Echoes of Nüwa: The Last Human Project, theSpace Triplex (Studio), until 23 Aug, 10am, £9-11