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Richard Carpenter is Close to You @ Underbelly George Square: Love Me For What I Am


Richard Carpenter is Close to You @ The Underbelly George Square

Matthew Floyd Jones is brilliant in this tribute to the lesser known member of the American musical royalty super group, The Carpenters. Within the show, Jones travels through the Carpenters’ greatest hits (while avoiding copyright issues), reminding you why the Carpenters were America’s sweethearts in the 70’s. But, after the tragic death of his sister, Richard Carpenter must cope with the pitfalls of being the lesser known member of a super-group.

Matthew Floyd Jones is superb as Richard Carpenter; he shines as the slightly insane, insecure, and conflicted protagonist of Richard Carpenter is Close to You. The musical parodies are sublime and blur the lines for someone like me who isn’t an extreme Carpenters fan, but knowledgeable by proxy of my mother. At points I wasn’t sure where the songs ended and parodies began, which is a testament to how well Jones reworked these classics. The show started with a parody medley of all the Carpenter’s greatest hits including “We’ve Only Just Begun,” commenting on how many people used this tune in their weddings…my mother and father had their first dance to this song…so yeah, spot on.

The script itself is quite funny as well. However, if you don’t know much about the history of the Carpenters, some of the jokes may be lost on you. But, Jones does a good job making the story more about Richard’s struggle in Purgatory than relying solely on inside jokes. I especially loved the scene where Richard was playing piano and his inner demons and self-doubt began to creep into his performance. Jones’ facial expressions within this scene were comedy gold; throughout the show, he reminded me so much of Bill Hader from SNL. However, at times the same ground is rehashed and The show does go a bit off the deep end towards the final ten minutes of the show. But Jones jumps back on track when Richard gives a rather unexpected and absurd performance of one of his songs from his solo album. I won’t spoil what happens, but Jones brings the house down. Even more brilliant is that after the show you can download the concept album Jones created as his alter ego Richard Carpenter from his website.

It was great to see such American nostalgia brought to life by Matthew Floyd Jones in Richard Carpenter is Close to You for the Edinburgh Fringe, and I can’t wait to see which obscure celebrity he will dig up for his next endeavor.

4 STARS


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