Matthew Sharp in… Finkelstein's Castle

Pleasance Courtyard    6 - 31 August (Only Certain Dates) @ 14.35    SharpWire

Finkelstein’s Castle is an entangled hybrid of horror spoof meets Jules Verne meets deep sea ghouls. Most of the action takes place in a fictional setting – a castle and surrounding waters off the North Sea coast near Gallumphing- on-Twee. In this one-man show, our narrator (Matthew Sharp) is summoned to the castle by a garbled message and an ominous butler figure. On arrival at the castle he comes across an international array of menacing larger than life guests with jokey names like Herr Transplant and Tony Panitoni. The audience are then obliged to keep track of fast moving events, and interchanges of characters, all of whom are deftly acted by Sharp.

With an impressive creative team (including director Will Tuckett, designer Tim Meacock and lighting designer Mark Howland) rays of creative professionalism glimmer through the production from time to time, but are ultimately overshadowed by a meandering outlandish storyline that does not know how to conclude. Despite this central hindrance, Sharp gives a versatile interpretation of the characters with a fine voiced performance in both dialect and song, and a highly enjoyable display of cello virtuosity.