Balloon Girl review – tech tycoon swirls with tragic teen parachutist in a crackling, time-travelling climate romp

Sherman theatre, Cardiff
Hannah McPake’s high-wire drama pokes fun at tech bro machismo, reality TV and Musk-style Martian escapes – think A Christmas Carol in space

This show takes local history as its starting point, that of a 19th-century balloonist’s assistant who performed a parachute stunt in the skies above Cardiff. It throws in a current-day tech billionaire, the space race, a time-travelling hot-air balloon, and – for good measure? – a lifesize seagull that speaks.

Surprisingly, given the complications of writer-director Hannah McPake’s high-wire drama, it lifts off, swirling through the clouds on its air-bound set, crackling with humour and effervescent imagination along with a keen sense of unwritten history, to become a complete blast.

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Source: Guardian Culture