Wednesday May 7, 12:16 PM

Review: One Man Star Wars Trilogy

By Mike Kilpatrick The galaxy's ultimate villain, Darth Vader, flanked by Princess Leia Organa and a Stormtrooper, made a brief appearance at SKYCITY Theatre in Auckland last night.

Thankfully the Dark Lord of the Sith wasn't here to star in yet another of George Lucas's Star Wars sagas, but to celebrate the opening night of one of this year's most anticipated comedy acts to hit our shores.

Having performed his one-man condensation of the original Star Wars trilogy worldwide, Charles Ross now has the opportunity to entertain Kiwi audiences as part of the NZ International Comedy Festival.

And entertain he did.

From the moment he stepped on the stage and mimicked the opening text-scrolling scene of Star Wars IV: A New Hope to the end of Return of the Jedi, the audience laughed, applauded and, at the appropriate moments, sat in silence.

Frankly, I was exhausted just watching him. With barely a swig of water between movie epics he jumped, strolled, crawled and strode across the width of the stage, invoking multiple characters, sound effects and songs from the film without missing a beat.

The biggest success, however, is Ross taking the epic space opera story beloved by millions and satirising it in such a way hardcore fans cannot be offended.

From Princess Leia's breathless concern ("It's Han. And the Metric System.") to Han Solo's "Dude, don't ever kiss your sister that way," his loving lampooning struck the right chords.

He even managed to turn Luke Skywalker from one of the great movie heroes into a crossover of Vicky Pollard from Little Britain and Chris from Family Guy without endangering the love of the audience.

Other successes included his pitch-perfect R2-D2, the expansive Jabba the Hutt impression and the death of the AT-AT Walkers, all interspersed with homo-erotic suggestions about the Dark Lord's minions and the Chewbacca roar.

My personal favourite was when Obi-Wan Kenobi tried to explain to Luke why Anakin turned into Darth Vader in the first place, using the logic from the latest three Star Wars films. I've got to say, it still didn't make a lot of sense!

Of course, the defining moment of the film was done brilliantly.

The famous scene when Luke takes off Darth Vader's helmet and the withered Dark Lord once again becomes Anakin Skywalker was the quietest the audience were all night. Until the inevitable satirical observation, that is.

Of course, no show is without its faults.

Ross, on occasion, speaks so fast I found it hard to hear some of the lines. And the needless inclusion (in my opinion) of a couple of Ewok squeaks made me cringe in a way only a Jar Jar Binks-hater could.

But neither of these were enough to spoil my enjoyment of a production which I would recommend to any Star Wars fans out there.

The one-hour show is a fantastic achievement, and Ross deserves the accolades which have been afforded to him during the 1,000 plus performances in 260 cities worldwide.

However, before you fork out the $44 for a ticket make sure you are up on the story lines of the films.

Despite having seen the films multiple times, there were parts which got laughs from a section of the audience that zoomed over my head like a TIE fighter - my geek credibility definitely took a hit!

After the credits had rolled, Ross knelt, Yoda-like, on the stage to tell us of his one-man Lord of the Rings trilogy which he hopes to bring to New Zealand next year.

If the applause in the audience to that announcement is anything to go by, we're already anticipating it.

Catch it while you can.

Charles Ross stars in the One Man Stars Wars Trilogy at the SKYCITY Theatre until Saturday May 10.