Orlandoan, Bruce Ryan Costella packs a lot into this hour long show at Banshee Labyrinth as part of the Edinburgh Horror Festival, maybe too much. Arcing from queer Halloween fairy tales through cowboy folk tales to real life gay bar shootings, with a splash of cheery then sad ukulele tunes thrown in for good measure. Uplifting in places, spooky at times, then desperately sad, it is all a bit of a rollercoaster to be honest.
Costella’s, Orlando homage ends rather unfunnily with his recounting of the mass shooting at Pulse, a gay nightclub in Florida in 2016, where 49 people died, and 53 were seriously injured. The overriding emotion at the conclusion of the show is of a man desperately trying to save himself with humour in spite of an overwhelming burden of grief. Which probably explains why the humour is never really funny.
That is not to say it is all bad, for when Costella sings he has a beautiful crisp confident tenor that rings out like a bell around the Cave bar walls, delicate lyrics spilling out, accompanied very effectively by his own strumming. More of that please!
So, lots of promise here, but much work. This workshop piece is really three shows in one, spooky Halloween stories, Poignant cowboy tales with prairie toons and the horror of Pulse Nightclub. I’d be happy to watch them all, I’m confident that Bruce would make a great job of all of them, just not all at the same time, please!
Reviewer: Greg Holstead
Reviewed: 1st November 2024
North West End UK Rating:
Running time – 1 Hr