At La Boite until 23 November, 2024. In conjunction with the National Theatre of Parramatta

“Yoga Play” is US slapstick. It has laugh out loud moments, with different cohorts within the audience laughing in response to jokes that tickled their own sense of humour. I particularly liked the “It doesn’t rain”…in California line. Others found “I’m single because I’m picky” hilarious. There were jokes for everyone.

The play juxtaposes corporate greed in the well-being industry with the “once upon a time” meaning of the term “well-being”. Working harder and harder to achieve something seems to ensure it slips out of reach.

Andrea Moor, as Joan, plays the new CEO of Jojomon, an international apparel company. She’s also the slapstick victim of womanhood, always used and abused and never understood. Yet, at the same time, pulling off miracles. Her hard brassy character, focused on EBIT, solves problems without ethical constraints. The end definitely justifies the means, because producing the ends is the only way she can be visible in such a skewed society.

Fred (played by Jemwel Danao) is a gay Singaporean, who has spent two years in jail for holding his lover’s hand in public. He’s desperate for a Green Card. And will eat whatever shit is served up in the US to stay there.

Raj Kapoor (played by Nat Jobe) is an Indian American of Hindu descent who achieved all his parent’s wishes for him, attending Harvard and intending to be a banker. But life doesn’t always turn out as planned in the USofA.

Romola (played by Camila Ponte Alvarez) provides the eye candy to the play. She’s the dumb yoga teacher, who actually practises yoga, but who bathes in the glory of LA celebrities. Camila does some very good transformations to also bring us Lucy, the PA, Lauren, the Jojomon celebrity presenter and Mrs Kapoor, the Indian mother of Raj. She covers a truly breathtaking range of voices and characters, seemingly effortlessly.

John is the company’s founder (played by Thomas Larkin) who is off with the fairies in an unkind way, and is totally self-indugent, though retaining corporate power. Thomas also provides the voice of Mr Kapoor, and also plays the entirely white Indian guru Alan, who brings a touch of philosophy to this otherwise comedic story.

The company, Jojomon, is essentially a leisure clothing company that grew out of the hippie era in California. Its reach is global and its sales figures impressive. Until it’s caught up in an outsourcing scam with its “ethical” product being created by slave labour in Calcutta. The BBC’s Panorama program gets a brief mention to add a dash of authenticity.

Staff in the company have to be seen to be living the dream: going to the gym, sharing their dreams with each other (that becomes tricky) and aspiring to shared goals that are to be reached, even if they bear no relation to what the staff member actually wants out of life. It’s a manufactured corporate culture, ironically true to the founder’s great desire to work as part of a family. Customers and staff: all part of the corporate family.

And so the slap stick continues. Paradox piles up upon paradox as the vision is pursued through all the tacky manipulation imaginable. As art imitates life, the characters find themselves going from bad to worse, much like the USA goes from bad to worse.

The technical aspects were well done. Kate Baldwin (Lighting), Wil Hughes (Sound) and James Lew (Set and Costumes) made it work. Their “Zoom” screen added a special part of corporate to the show.

The play has everything: fat shaming, cultural misappropriation, exploitation, yoga mats, green drinks, spiritualism and even a love story. On top of that, it sells authenticity, and demands we co-create our future. US humour at its most slapstick.

Come and see it at La Boite until 23 November 2024. Book here: https://laboite.com.au/shows/yoga-play

Kerry McGovern

Photo courtesy of La Boite