Encore Michigan

Harry Potter and the satirists’ barbs

Review April 29, 2015 Martin F. Kohn

Much like “The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (abridged)” covers the Bard in a couple of hours, complete with popular culture references, “Potted Potter” has its way with J.K. Rowling’s magnum opus, proving that you’re never too old, or too young, for silliness.

Young is the important word here. The zany Potter parody, by Daniel Clarkson and Jefferson Turner, performed by fellow Brits Joseph Maudsley and James Percy, is aimed at people old enough to have read the seven Harry Potter books and youthful enough to find Silly String, a Super Soaker and a couple of toy warthogs on a skateboard (warthogs being a play on Hogwarts) hilarious.

OK, I got the warthogs and the warthogs got me, but I’ll admit that “Potted Potter” is not my cup of butterbeer. (Yes, I’ve read the books.) But anything that gets people from upper elementary age to high school age excited about live theater deserves rousing cheers.

Maudsley and Percy certainly earn theirs as they romp, stomp and scamper, having the time of their lives (or pretending to). Besides hitting the plot highlights of Rowling’s oeuvre, they’re quick with an improvised quip and make everything they do look easy, which it isn’t.

The opening night audience, youthful and enthusiastic, was very much home in the world of “Potted Potter” but if you’re not familiar with the saga of the boy wizard, his classmates and teachers at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and Harry’s nemesis, Voldemort, you’ll be lost.

That doesn’t mean you can’t appreciate “Potted Potter” with its nods to “War Horse,” “The Chronicles of Narnia,” “The Hobbit” and its big disco number. Or the spectacle of two grown men acting like a pair of 9-year-olds experiencing a sugar rush.

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