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A giant of a show for youngsters
James and
the Giant Peach Belgrade
Theatre **** I
WISH I were six again – well, only for the purposes of enjoying this
magical, dynamic, inventive and totally riveting Birmingham Stage
Company's production of Roald Dahl's James and the Giant Peach. The old
theatre adage about ‘suspension of disbelief' just doesn't hold – it
just IS magic. You might know the story, have
maybe read it fifteen thousand times to your children, as have I, but it
bears retelling. Tom Gillies plays the young
James whose parents die in a freak accident with an escaped Rhinoceros
and he is sent to cruel aunts (Roald Dahl does hideous adults so well).
Aunt Sponge (Claire Greenway) and Aunt Spiker.(Giovanna Ryan) are dead
ringers for the ugly sisters and, true to form, James has to work long
hours scrubbing the kitchen … until a man – actually a wonderful puppet
- appears with some magic beans that make enormous things happen. He accidentally loses them but
the garden fauna – a worm (Rhys Saunders), a spider (Sioned Saunders), a
ladybird (Claire Greenway), a centipede (Chris Lindon), a
grasshopper (Iwan Tudor) find eat them. One lands in the peach
tree. The enormous consequences are obvious and Aunts Spiker and Sponge
charge exorbitant fees for people to see the giant peach. The section of Brian (Oliver
Lynes) and camera operator (Giovanna Ryan) from the James lives in the peach with
the enormous insects, all good and versatile musicians, until it breaks
lose from its moorings and heads across the Atlantic (propelled by
seagulls, pursued by sharks, threatened by aircraft) for New York to
land on the spike of the Empire State Building. What I loved about this
production was the transparency of the magic. I was intrigued to see how
the peach was going to grow – but that was tackled so simply and
credibly. Apart from some dry ice when things really needing concealing,
the wings are exposed behind the proscenium arch created on stage for
the show. I enjoyed the use of the puppets to tell the story. This is a
wonderful production that all the family can enjoy but for your
roundabout sixes, this is a real treat. Adapted David Wood and directed
by Nikolai Foster the peach grows until Jun 15. Jane Howard
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