Birdhouse[author-post-rating] 3/5 stars

It’s hard to know what to expect from Birdhouse. Taking its inspiration from Alfred Hitchcock’s classic and beloved film The Birds, Jammy Voo iz concerned with a small group of women who sought sanctuary in the cinema at Bodega Bay. It’s an interesting premise, playing at the edges of such a famous film, and you inevitably picture a sort of zombie lock-in, one hour of intensity and sanctuary in keeping with the interminable tension of The Birds. Nothing could be further from the truth; in fact, having established this premise, Jammy Voo seems barely interested in it.

What they are interested in, exactly, is difficult to say – Birdhouse is comprised of so many different parts and ideas that it feels more like a cabaret show than a piece of theatre. Accompanied by the musician hiding out in the popcorn booth, the four ladies sing us several beautiful, tenuously-related songs about owls and forests; they perform shadow puppetry; they perform actual puppetry; there is a faux-game show sequence where two of them must answer questions about what you call various groups of birds – parliaments of owls, murders of crows and so on.

It’s bird-heavy, naturally, but somehow doesn’t feel all that heavy on The Birds. There’s one beautiful, noir-ish sequence, done with lighting and shadow-projection, which sees the four women driving to Bodega Bay to defend their title at the Ladies’ Twitchers’ Association Quiz, little knowing what awaits them there. It’s a relief to see something resembling a plot, but the relief is short-lived, as any sense of a cohesive narrative beginning to form dissolves away again immediately after the end of this one scene.

The kind of experimentalism in Birdhouse – music, puppets, fourth wall-breaking – can form the most exciting and enjoyable complement to an already gripping production. Here, though, it just doesn’t quite do that; Jammy Voo hasn’t established enough of a plot for it to cling to in the first place. It’s enjoyable enough to watch, and all of the performers are likeable and talented – in fact, as simply a showcase for the talents of these Lecoq graduates, the show makes a kind of sense. But the lovely costumes, the beautifully-designed puppets, indicate that something with more thought behind it is supposed to be happening here. It’s just hard to say what that is.

Far from unenjoyable to watch, you do still come away with a sense of Birdhouse not having done quite what it said on the tin.

Birdhouse can be seen at the Assembly George Square at 17.30 every day until 25 August. For more information and tickets visit the Edinburgh Fringe website.