Glasgow Theatre Blog

Lionel McLion has been roaming the plains of the Serengeti and is having a rest after having eaten his dinner, but all is not as usual. Lionel gets a bit of a fright when Mamoru, the human he’s just eaten, starts talking back.

The highly acclaimed, children’s theatre piece Eaten, starts not only a conversation between the eater and the eaten, but a wider discussion about our relationship to food (including Lionel’s impossible dream of becoming a vegetarian), where it comes from, and what happens after we’ve chomped it down.

For the kiddie audience there are many moments that engage: there are poos, farts and vomit involved and some audience participation where the tiny folk get to be a giraffe, a monkey, a cow or a frog – what’s not to love for the 6+ target audience.

It slips into the surreal often and is hysterically funny in parts: there’s a Q and A session when the tiny audience are confronted by Dr. Poo (from Pooniversity) imploring them to ask a question to their faeces – it’s hard to keep a straight face at their reactions and an off-the-wall dance section to Engelbert Humperdinck’s Last Waltz. 

The ideas are sound, but the script at times smacks of someone who doesn’t know how to pitch to small children – when the question is asked of a puppet cow Are you real or just a concept? you know that this isn’t someone who spends time with a lot of  6-year-olds.

Mamoru Iriguchi plays both predator and prey simultaneously, both he and co-performer Suzi Cunningham are engaging. It must be said though that Iriguchi needs to hone his child interaction and wrangling skills to make this a truly successful endeavour. That said, Eaten raises not only some important questions but many smiles too.

A worthy watch.