The three young women who make up A Lot Of Bread had a popular show at the Melbourne Fringe Festival, and have followed that up with Putting Hats on Ducks, a very imaginative tale of three farmers whose land is taken over by the railroad.  The railroad in question is coming through ‘for the barnacles’ – I told you it was imaginative.

The farmers decide to take on the big end of town and finish up having to find three objects, an echidna quill, a turtle shell and Phar Lap’s heart, before the big boss will cancel his railroad plans.

The journey takes them from the farm through the jungle to the bottom of the sea, and gives the personable but dumb cowpokes a chance to sing songs, use whimsical homemade props and create excruciating puns; I’d certainly never made a connection between echidna and e-kid-napping before

It’s a very silly story, which isn’t itself necessarily a criticism.  It meandered zanily all over the place – try connecting a talking ashtray, Daniel Kowalski and a railroad mogul whose head is a full tray of lasagna.  It’s weird and occasionally wonderful.  The women are wholesome and wholehearted with undoubted comedic talent and many surreal ideas but an unpolished script.  It’s a bit Monty Python without the divine brilliance and inspiration.

I really wanted to like it a lot and hoped that the loose ends would tie up somehow.  If they did, I missed it.  Perhaps that was just the final absurdity.