50 YEARS OF DOCTOR WHO: PREACHRS PODCAST LIVE 2! Box Factory Community Centre Until 16 Feb 2014 Review by Benjamin Orchard “Doctor Who” fans looking for a pleasant nostalgia trip in the wake of the show’s 50th Anniversary, will find much to warm the heart and tickle the funnybone in this good natured slice of Fringe comedy. There is a loose plot that frames the proceedings. Davros, the mad scientist who invented the infamous sink-plunger wielding fascist pepperpots, The Daleks, is having some trouble with his creations. Due to some computer virus, his minions have been afflicted with amnesia, and have totally forgotten all their past encounters with Time’s Champion, The Doctor. So, Davros does the most logical thing in this situation, he abducts two hardcore Australian Whovians – teen internet broadcaster, Benjamin Maio MacKay and thirtysomething comedian, Rob Lloyd – and sets them the task of re-educating The Daleks on the life and times of their greatest enemy. Whereupon MacKay and Lloyd launch into an amiable stand-up history of the TV show, it’s characters, themes and turbulent production history, punctuated by slideshows, pre-recorded video featuring interviews with former-stars and some wacky, off the wall audience participation activities, including pop quizzes and charades, in which prizes are up for grabs. Curiously, it is Lloyd, the senior of the pair, who is the most flamboyant in gushing over his favourite actors, regaling the audience with embarrassing stories from his childhood detailing the extent of his obsession and doing some energetic one-man re-enactments of the show’s most iconic scenes. The teenage MacKay plays straight man for the most part, carefully explaining the facts and providing the more in depth intellectual analysis of the evening. They make for a most amusing odd couple. Their onstage interactions with the life-size, fully operational Daleks are also amusing, though it’s a shame that the small performance space doesn’t give the pepperpots that much room to move. This is a show for fans only. Despite the mock-educational format, there is a lot of assumed knowledge and most of the jokes will fly right over the heads of non-Whovians. That said, McKay and Lloyd have taken care to include enough material to engage all three major types of Whovian: 1) Those people who were introduced to “Doctor Who” through the 1963-1989 TV series 2) Those people who were introduced to “Doctor Who” through the more recent TV revival 3) Those people who were introduced to “Doctor Who” through non-TV media such as comic books, novels and radio plays. The crowd present on opening night were a wide variety of different ages, from tween children, teens, twentysomethings, fortysomethings, right up to people in their 60s, yet the laugh rate was consistently high and evenly spread across the entire audience. A testament to both the enduring appeal of the show itself, and the depth of understanding McKay and Lloyd have of their subject. Rating: 3.5 stars (out of 5)