Mister Jackpot ****

Nike Redding delivers a slick, stylish performance in this monologue, the fourth in Teatro Fisico's five show fringe day. It is the best constructed character of Fisico's five plays. It is also the one with the most obvious pacing issues. But ultimately, this show bowls you over as a miming, moving depiction of gambling addiction. 

Mister Jackpot's surfing on buses, perhaps the play's most compelling sequence, and the one that kicks it off. He's singing Sinatra crooners and imagining himself as James Bond. A sequence as Bond ensues, and it is delivered with a warm humour and charm. 

Jackpot is a fascinating character, and the arc is very well written. We see a tendency to have compulsive behaviours from very early on. We see his dreams of glory, and all the seeds are set for his descent. He eavesdrops on some guys winning 25 grand on the horses, goes to the bathroom and sees a door into a casino… a slot machine. Here Corradini's direction constructs the Vegas lights with the sound of slots and Redding's eyes. 

This is a really smart depiction of gambling, on a strictly formal level. It explains the hormonal drives that move us to gamble. It shows a man fall in love with a slot machine. Although perhaps what it doesn't do so well is construct relationships around him that would be destroyed by the addiction. He falls in love with a member of the audience; this might not be quite enough. 

Here Corradini is slightly restricted by his form, which tends to focus primarily on the physicality of one character, only sometimes breaking out into alternates. In some ways, this is the thrill of his theatre - these are monologists who are unapologetic in performing monologues. But here, in an addiction which so drastically changes your life's context, I was left wanting to see the effects more clearly. 

Still, on the whole, this is riveting stuff. Any Teatro Fisico show is a throwback to a sort of theatre I have only glimpsed in my lifetime – physically rigorous, impeccably performed, and written with grace, style and a searching morality.