Comedy characters James and Jamesy are headed back to Surrey with an interactive show that’s become a holiday hit for the duo.
“O Christmas Tea” is currently on a 58-show tour, scheduled to stop at Bell Performing Arts Centre for a pair of performances Friday, Dec. 29, first at 3 p.m. and again at 7:30.
Fans of Mr. Bean, Monty Python and Dr. Seuss will probably enjoy the mix of physical comedy, quick-wit wordplay and interactive elements of the show, which hit the boards at the Sullivan-area theatre a couple of times in recent years.
“O Christmas Tea” is the most popular of five productions brought to the stage by Aaron Malkin (who plays James) and Alastair Knowles (the more eccentric Jamesy). Together they weave antics, storytelling and imagination into a story of a tea-flooded world where James and Jamsey must find ways to keep themselves afloat while trying to make their way back home.
I caught up with Malkin for a phone interview Nov. 22, early in the current tour of B.C., Washington State and Oregon. What follows is a Q&A.
Has the show changed since last performed in Surrey?
Malkin: “We’ve added a couple of scenes – you know, cut some fat from the show, and we’re just trying some new ideas. With the additions and how they’re being received on this tour so far, we’re feeling better about the show than ever before. We love putting our best foot forward, or feet, so anything we can do to improve the audience experience is what we do. It’s just really gratifying to have that much appreciation and joy from an experience that we’re creating in theatres.”
Where are you based these days?
“I live on the Sunshine Coast and Alastair currently lives in Winnipeg. We met in Vancouver during a show about 10 years ago, at a time neither us were thinking that theatre would be our career. It was more of a large-cast, community-produced show we both got involved in. We had a five-week run and really enjoyed working with each other, to the extent that when the show’s run was over, we wanted to keep working together. Alastair had an idea for a show and, with a few other people, created a show on our own, a first for us. That led to Alastair and I working closely together and ultimately realizing that we want to create the same kind of show.”
CLICK HERE to watch a show promo video.
How did you create the James and Jamesy characters?
“We kind of happened up on them, and when we put them in a skit together, in a cabaret, the audience response was unlike any we’d ever had before. There was a prof from a New York theatre school there in the audience. Our director and clown teacher was also there, and they both said, you know, ‘You have gold here, and you can mine it if you want, take these characters as far as you want.’ There was just a chemistry.”
Why does it work on stage so well?
“I think something in all of our shows is this juxtaposition of English propriety with the absurd, you know, a kind of comparison that you’ll find in Mr. Bean skits and Monty Python, and those were influences for both of us growing up. James is a very everyday kind of relatable guy and Jamesy is quite eccentric, kind of hard to grasp, and you see those characters interfacing through the show. It creates some wonderfully delightful scenarios for us to perform in and for the audience to witness and interact with in various ways.”
How do you involve audiences in ‘O Christmas Tea’?
“Their participation is kind of what you’d expect in a classic British panto, you know, with the audience calling out stuff or call-and-response kinds of things. But we go a step further and give opportunities for some people in the audience to actually don a costume and join us on stage as a character. It’s not planned in advance. While we’re performing the show we’re scoping out the audience to see who we think could play a role, typically an adult. So in the photos and videos you see, the other performers with us are audience members wearing costumes. Doing that keeps it exciting for everyone, and we look for people who want to step into the opportunity. We want to make them shine as much as we can.”
What’s next you and Alastair beyond the current tour?
“We have other shows including a new one, ‘Easy as Pie,’ but ‘O Christmas Tea’ is what we’ve made an annual tradition now and put the most effort into, production-wise. It’s become a wonderland. You know, we have three different kinds of snow, three different kinds of fog and smoke effects, we’ve got all sorts of fun things to help create the immersive experience that we do in the theatre.”
Can you tell me more about the new show?
“We toured it this past summer, and will continue to work on it for another tour in March, in the Kootenays and Interior. In ‘Easy as Pie,’ we look like stereotypical circus clowns, which is not something we’ve done in any of our other shows. The premise is that James and Jamesy decide that they want to do a clown performance, and that performance culminates in James receiving a pie to the face, but for some reason, he won’t let that happen, or Jamesy just can’t do it. So that becomes something for them to figure out, and Jamesy ends up going into James’s brain and looking around to try to find the source of the problem. There’s a whole black-light world that we create and costumes and makeup. About a third of the shows takes place in that setting. With that and other shows, we’re creating work that we can tour outside of the Christmas season.”