Fringe 2010: Tom Allen's canine co-star evicted from show under Dangerous Dogs Act
July 22, 2010 10:01am by Such Small Portions
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Comedian Tom Allen has found himself in an unexpected confrontation with Fringe organisers at the Gilded Balloon after his co-star Maggie was evicted from his show under the Dangerous Dogs Act.
Allen, whose Fringe performance this year ‘Tom Allen Toughens Up’ delves into the fear and confrontation side of the British national psyche, had included a Rottweiler as his star attraction.
However after complaints from audiences during some of his London previews the Gilded Balloon venue where Allen is due to perform his show have said that the dog is not allowed to enter the building without being properly accredited with a permit.
Allen said "I'm so angry. Talk about being tough - it's not getting into fisty coughs that matters, it's fighting idiot bureaucracy that really counts. Maggie would've been wonderful!
"Its discrimination really. If Maggie had been a small terrier, she’d just be considered cute. This huge furore is just because she’s big and black – when really she’s a sweet dog who spends most of the performance staring at me with her big brown eyes and panting at my feet.
“You only have to spend five minutes with her to know she hasn’t the killer instinct in her. She loves an audience!”
Under the Dangerous Dogs Act, a dog may be excluded from specific places whether or not the dog has been shown to have injured any person, if there are grounds for reasonable apprehension that it could injure a person.
Rob Sandy at Richard Bucknall Management claims its not only the shows’ creativity that will suffer:
“All flyers and adverts have been printed way in advance promoting Maggie and Tom together.
"Audiences will be disappointed and we could be seriously out of pocket as a result – not to mention the advert is now unrepresentative and may be pulled by the Advertising Standards Committee.”
Allen has started a petition on his website calling on the public to demand Maggie’s Maggie’s re entry to the show this August www.tomindeed.com.
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