Review: KABOOM! at The Pleasure Garden
KABOOM! at The Hat Trick @ The Pleasure Garden
Saturday, February 11, 2023
6/10
“Safety 3rd. Coolness 1st” teaches our KABOOM! host, Magnus D. (is for Danger) Magnus.
The fun-loving science educator takes the audience on a journey of experimentation for kids in this live Fringe World performance. For those kids not convinced that science is cool, Magnus cleverly quips the importance in our lives of GPS, cold ice cream, and eradicating polio.
Pulling out all the chemistry tricks, from hydrogen peroxide (aka elephant toothpaste) to liquid nitrogen, Magnus’ excitement for science encouraged shouting and fist-pumping. According to Magnus, “chemistry is just like Lego. If you have enough pieces you can make anything” which is a superb analogy for an audience of seven year olds.
Aside from the science itself, Magnus also sneaks in some life lessons. With a generation of children often too nervous to try for risk of failure, Magnus encourages just giving it a try without guaranteeing success. And sometimes the experiments actually don’t work just right… but that’s okay. Magnus also calls his ADHD his “superpower” which brought some great cheers from corners of the crowd.
There are a few items of showmanship that Magnus could improve upon. While choosing kid volunteers from the audience is great for engagement, it dramatically slowed down the pace of the show while the audience waited for them to climb the steps, introduce them, put on safety gear etc. He would be better off using a single assistant and keeping the pace up, as all the delays forced Magnus to rush the ending and go 10 minutes overtime.
A few practical tips for the parents are to get in line early as the view from the back rows is not good for small bodies. Secondly, save some time in your schedule afterwards as kids will want to line up to meet Magnus and his hairless cat Artemis, and enjoy a wander around the beautiful Pleasure Garden too.
KABOOM! is a fun and shouty science show, but could use a few improvements to be a great example of the genre.
MELISSA MANN