A Jane Austen inspired comedy show took place last week in the vibrant venue, Kings Place, as one of its weekly comedy events.
“Austentatious: An Improvised Jane Austen novel” is an hour-long comedy play with a cast of six young and talented people, who recreate made up Jane Austen novels with titles suggested by the audience.
“We ask the audience for a made-up title and then perform a completely improvised comedy play based on whatever title we get,” said Andy Murray, one member of the cast.
The sold out show took place on Thursday, 24th January, in the Kings Cross venue in York Way, marking the celebration of 200th anniversary of Austen’s most famous novel ‘Pride and Prejudice’.
The comedians, who were dressed up in medieval costumes, gave the audience a sheet of paper at the beginning of the show. They were asked to write down a completely random name for Austen’ novels and leave the paper in a basket.
The title chosen by lottery was “Tax and Taxation”, and the laughs started straight away, with everyone wondering how they were going to manage this title.
“It is the first time we have had them here but we want them to come back for sure,” said Zoë Jeyes, Operations and HR Manager of Kings Place Music Foundation. Zoë, who saw the comedy group at Fringe Edinburgh Festival last year, described them as “fantastic.”
“Austentatious” is performed by The Milk Monitors, with characteristic language and scenarios of the time when Austen was alive with a violin accompaniment.
The dark and intimate room hosted 200 people, many of whom already knew the project from previous shows. “You need to keep your mind open. We never know what’s going to happen. Neither do they,” said a spectator to another.
“The audience is a complete mix – some people have read all of Jane Austen’s books, some haven’t read any,” said Andy Murray.
“King’s Place is a beautiful location, and we’ll hopefully be back this autumn,” he added.
The venue is namely a music venue, but in 2009 they started hosting comedy nights to offer more variety to the public.
Zoë Jeyes organises the “Out With Their Heads!” comedy program at Kings Place.
She said: “We are really interested in the quality, for the performances to be innovative and give the public something different. Today is a great example.”
“The great thing about them is that it’s going to be different every time. The audience seems to love them,” she added.
In fact, there were really funny and unexpected moments, always with intelligent humour.
“Austentatious is really for anyone who likes sharp, clever comedy and wants to spend a delightful evening watching super-funny people making things up as they go along,” the cast said.
They act twice a month in the The Wheatsheaf pub, in Rathbone Place and once a month in Leicester Square Theatre. Tickets are £5 and can be booked in advance.
You can count on creativity, originality, very intelligent humour and unexpected moments all the time you attend this show.
The Milk Monitors is preparing to start performing shows at the Old Queen’s Head in Angel. The shows are arranged for the 11st March and 22nd April. Anyone interested can reserve a seat in advance by emailing austenimpro@gmail.com.