There are plenty of fringe productions that are so bad they are unintentionally hilarious, and then there is Bad Play. This intentional travesty by sketch trio The Trap combines every cock-up in the book to deliver a ham-fisted hour that is as flimsy as an Acorn Antiques set but hugely enjoyable. Particularly for anyone who has ever attempted to mount a performance on a pittance.
The threesome - Jeremy Limb, Paul Litchfield and Dan Mersh - is supposed to be presenting a po-faced piece of post-9/11 agitprop, but from the moment they blunder on in front of a mini World Trade Center made of Jenga bricks the endeavour is ill-starred. Cues are missed, lines are fluffed and in one glorious moment a crashing spotlight nearly turns the trio into a duo.
Limb is particularly bad (ie good) as the pasty-faced Homeless Eric, who highlights the negative effects of capitalism. Mersh oozes overwrought sleaze as sexual predator Gary and Litchfield is suitably manic as the wage-slave worm who turns against his fatcat boss. Only the incessant all-round bellowing oversteps the parodic mark.
Garth Marenghi assaults the horror genre more gracefully, while The League Of Gentlemen covered similarly didactic ground with its Legz Akimbo Theatre-In-Education routine. But there is a committed through-line of stupidity here that even extends to the programme, which is printed upside down.
At least I assume this is intentional.
Until 22 February. Information: 020 7482 4857.
Bad Play
