If theatre of the absurd tickles your fancy, you will have a field day with theatre company Pummel Squad’s Marginalia. It is a new play adapted from Nikolai Gogol’s 1936 satirical short story ‘The Nose’. That was about a St Petersburg official who awakens to find his proboscis has disappeared and taken on a life of its own. The controversial text was censored at the time for its skewering of Russian politics and its exploration of vanity and political opportunism.
So, given we are living in a heightened, image-obsessed, volatile age, Pummel Squad felt it was ripe for the picking. Marginalia looks at satire in 2026, where political extremism has entered the mainstream. In the work, barber Tyler* – whose life calling is athletic prowess against a backdrop of loud, pulsating music – gets beaten up for a crime they didn’t commit. That has everything to do with a much-loved clown, called Clowno, being gunned down by overly officious military officials arguing over a machine gun.
On the same day, Major Pepsi, who runs several government departments, is horrified when he wakes up to find that he no longer has a snout. Distraught, he is concerned about the ignominy and ridicule he will face. The situation is made worse because he and his equally pretentious mother are due to attend the year’s most prestigious party, the Governor General’s ball. We, the audience, are in for a wild and rocky ride, as Marginalia pokes the bear of privilege while trying to save face.
Pummel Squad is a daring young ensemble company, known for its cartoonish performance style, elaborate handmade designs, and love of classic literature. So, it doesn’t hold back, with outrageous characterisations being par for the course. The larger-than-life characters in Marginalia include a nose of gigantic proportions.
Writers Ludomyr Kemp-Mykyta and Cooper Donald McDonald have outdone themselves and continue to push the envelope in this work. Crafting the extreme on the page is but the first step though. Bringing the bold to life is another. And this is where the designers, performers and director come in.
The six actors, many of whom play multiple roles, do an outstanding job, delivering the biting wit with alacrity and polish. I speak of Alexandra Aldrich, AYA, Molly Holohan, Ludomyr Kemp-Mykyta, Cooper Donald McDonald and Harry McGee. Not a weak link amongst them. They dazzle and delight, transitioning from one catastrophe to another. If the question is what else could possible go wrong, the answer is plenty.
Set and costume designer Savanna Wegman is so imaginative, enabling her visualisations to all but become characters in their own right. It is important here to also mention the wigs and make up as vital ingredients off the imaginings before us. The noisy, evocative sounds crafted by composer and sound designer Justin Gardam add another dimension. Often, the mood is key and that is reflected in Amelia Lever-Davidson’s lighting design.
With dramaturgy by Mark Pritchard, director Katy Maudlin is on song pulling all the threads together in a piece that smacks of parody extraordinaire. Ninety minutes without interval, Pummel Squad is on at fortyfivedownstairs until 16th August, 2026.
* As Tyler, Ludomyr Kemp-Mykyta spends the first minutes of the production running around in circles to Fatboy Slim’s 1998 big beat hit Right Here, Right Now.
Alex First
Other reviews you might enjoy:
- Never Closer (Patalog Theatre Company), at fortyfivedownstairs – theatre review
- Cyrano de Bergerac (Artefact Theatre Company), at fortyfivedownstairs – theatre review
- Where is Joy?, at fortyfivedownstairs – theatre review
Alex First is the editor of The Blurb. Alex is a Melbourne based journalist and communications specialist. He also contributes to The Blurb on film and theatre.
