A Las Vegas showgirl emerges from a month lost in the forest - muddy, disheveled and more animal than human. Somebody explains the expenses involved in being authentic. One woman reads pheromones. Another explains her 'instinct for failure'.
In All Natural the stage is home to several odd-bods from the fringes. Armed with excuses, promises and outbursts, they leak and slide into each other. Hoping for a pure and un-corrupted state, they search for limits on behaving with an audience.
McIntosh began All Natural by picking at the myth of naturalness and our craving for it - in everything from personality to food. As if our instincts, however deeply buried and warped, might be trusted to lead us out of trouble.
I have an instinct for failure, I can smell it coming. It's a natural thing. Yeah I can smell it now...
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
"This is a beautifully strange, unhinged and intimate performance. I think we will be seeing a lot more of Kate here at Tramway in the future." (Steve Slater, senior producer Tramway, programme 05 Tramway).
"Along with the very reduced, effective sound design, Kate McIntosh creates a space of fundamental uncertainty and loss. In All Natural Kate profoundly proves her performance skills, which are very powerful in effect but at no point pretentious or pathetic. Whereas her character on stage suffers the loss of identity and orientation, the performer Kate precisely knows where she is on this sensitive line between illusion and situation on stage." (Thomas Frank - Dramaturg, Sophiensaele Berlin).
"All Natural is built on the simple presence of the performer, and presence is a quality Kate McIntosh has in plenty. She sweeps through her performance, giving out treats and cracking the whip. Sometimes she gets on fine with the audience, sometimes she treats them like lowlife. She changes disposition at the snap of a finger - smiles like Doris Day, throws the look of Charles Bronson about to pull his gun. We feel pulled along by the nose-ring, and it is strangely pleasant." (Frankfurter Rundschau 23/10/04).
