Simon Ward reviews I’m A Philosopher Why The #@$% Am I Here?

It is a very funny premise for a comedy show. Take a bunch of philosophers, whose stock in trade is to unpick the differences between appearance and reality, and place them in the egregiously unreal world of ‘reality television’, where how things appear is the only currency. Roger Francis has written a play which delights in undermining the pomposities of the great (and not so great) philosophers as well as the absurdities of reality TV and the fact that it looms so large in our cultural landscape. There are gags about the low quality of the so-called celebrities, the gratuitously cruel nature of the challenges, the audience’s prurient desires and callous indifference to the human beings involved. There is also a very good running joke referring to Waiting for Godot – there is a pronounced mixture of high and low comedy here.

This an interactive version of ‘I’m A Celebrity’ and we, the audience are supposed to be watching at home. In the theatre, we also have access to a voting app so we can vote people on and off in the now traditional manner, as well as deciding who should perform the challenges. As with all TV votes, these may or may not be rigged so that they know what actors will be on stage at any given time, but I have no evidence that this is the case. I do know that we were able to vote and results appeared on screen. When things look like they are in danger of getting too serious, or when there is a point to be put across particularly strongly, everything stops and whoever is on stage lip synchs and dances (very enjoyable choreography by Angela Botha) to an eclectic songbook.

The choice of philosophers must have been tricky. First up are Jean-Jacques Rousseau (Senne Lambrechts) in show-stealing wig, white face paint and eighteenth century garb, and Thomas Hobbes (Oscar Nicholson), much more simply attired and clutching a teddy. Nicely pitched against each other – Hobbes’s claim that only an orderly state can prevent anarchy clashes with Rousseau’s idea that people should be freed from societal constraints to allow their natural goodness to flourish. Unfortunately, the format does not really allow for much development, so this does get a bit repetitive. Into this mix are thrown ultra-individualist Ayn Rand (Laura Shipler Chico) , animal rights campaigner Peter Singer (Will Robertson), and controversialists Jordan Peterson (Will Robertson) and Judith Butler (Laura Shipler Chico). Beyond a funny scene where Singer tries to use his philosophy to talk down a hungry bear (Laura Shipler Chico) and an angry confrontation between Butler and Peterson, they do not add much to the central debate.

Directed by Maddie Hurley, this is a warm, funny show. Some of the truly great philosophers are dotted around the theatre, delivering their nuggets of wisdom through audience members, with, of course, varying degrees of success. The ending, though, is a genuinely hilarious coup de théâtre and rounds the whole piece off brilliantly.

I’m A Philosopher Why The #@$% Am I Here? is running as part of the Camden Fringe at The Cockpit Theatre, Gateforth Street, London NW8 8EH until Saturday 15th August