Hold On To Your Butts is a high-speed send-up of the Hollywood blockbuster which sparked a craze for dinosaurs which has never gone away. Hold On To Your Butts began life in New York and then sold out at the Edinburgh Festival before transferring to London.
Charlie is the show’s foley artist, a term which even those familiar with theatre might struggle to explain but in effect she creates every sound as the two actors – Jack Baldwin and Laurence Pears – recreate Jurassic Park.
“The basic premise is I have a desk of lots of different props, all of which can be used for different things to recreate a sound.,” said Charlie. “With this show it’s all happening live; there are no sounds in the show I don’t make.”
From roaring dinosaurs to a car chase, Charlie provides the sounds to go along with the frantic action.
“The show would brilliant with the two of them miming everything but it’s that extra level of sound that audiences always comment on,” she said. “With the two boys, we play together. It’s not just them doing a play and I’m at one side making noises; we are interacting all the time.”
The nature of the show means that there is scope for the performers to improvise and Charlie has to follow whatever they are doing.
Laurence Pears, Charlie Ives and Jack Baldwin in Hold On To Your Butts (Picture: Mark Senior)“It does require a lot of concentration but it’s also such good fun,” she said. “I have given them total permission to ad lib. I’ve got to know that look in their eyes when they are about to do something that’s unplanned so I’m ready for whatever they might do.
“I think the audiences love those moments as they can tell it’s spontaneous.”
If you were going to do a spoof of a hit movie, there would be many easier ones to tackle than the special-effects laden Jurassic Park.
“It lends itself so well to parody because it is so good,” said Charlie. “The characters are so clearly defined and so much care went into the original film; we put as much care into our version.”
As well as her array of props, Charlie relies heavily on her voice to produce many of the required sounds.
“If you looked at the script against my name at certain points it will just say ‘mouth’,” she laughed. “I’ve had to come up with the appropriate sounds as we’ve been working through rehearsals.
“It’s not like learning lines, you can’t really do a run through on your own. There’s not much you can do outside the rehearsal process.”
For all the slapstick nature of the production, much of the show’s success is down to its precision.
“The stage manager and I have devised a strict system of where every single item goes so that every prop is always in the same place,” said Charlie. “So much of it is muscle memory now. My brain thinks ‘I need to pick up that bottle’ and it’s already in my hand and ready to go.
“It becomes like a sort of dance routine; I’m always interacting with what the boys are doing so there’s a real sense of rhythm which you fit into.”
But how do you know what a T-Rex sounds like or which object might work best to recreate the sound of a car door slamming?
“I had benefit of the show being created in New York so they had done lot of the work discovering what would be needed,” she said. “By the time we came on board there was already a framework that I was able to build on. Some of those props have changed and I’ve been able to add things where needed.”
An actor and musician, this is Charlie’s first production as the designated foley artist.
“I think I was really lucky to find a new skill I’m really good at,” she said. “It blends skills which I had in a way which are quite specific. They were asking for an actor, musician and singer with a comedy background and an aptitude for creating sound effects with my voice and that’s where I see myself.
“I think from being a little kid I’ve always been making funny sounds; I just thought everyone did it. But to be a foley it’s all about vocal control and timing. Weirdly I seem to have fused all my skills into one role.”
The role of the foley artist is a relatively new addition to theatre and Charlie acknowledges that most people don’t really know what she does.
“I don’t think by just describing it to people they can really get it. When I try they always get this look on their faces if to say ‘what do you mean you’re doing sound effects?’.
“It’s so much more than that; you just have to see it. For me it’s pure joy. I basically get to play and call it work. There is so much going on and it can be so fast-paced and yet we are perfectly in synch and the audiences are laughing – it’s really quite magical.”
Hold on to Your Butts is at The Octagon Bolton tonight and The Dukes, Lancaster on April 4 and 5
