Reviewed by Fran Edwards
June 2011
If children’s theatre is fun and fairy tales are good, how much more good fun can you have if you use all the fairy tales and 100 children! Lots!
Judy Sampson has written and directed an interesting piece of youth theatre. We all know the fairy tales, but what happens if they get unwritten and an evil wizard wants to re-write them without the happy endings?
This story had everything, two wizards (one good, one bad), an evil queen and you can take your pick of princesses, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Belle, Rapunzel, Goldilocks, Snow White even Dorothy! The list goes on, up to 100 characters in fact. There were fairies, elves, toys, dwarfs, pigs, Lost Boys (plus Peter), bears, bees, butterflies, ugly sisters and various other characters who pop up. Not to forget the four children who go to Fairy Land to help fix the problem.
All the cast had fun, no-one was bad and it is really difficult to single out performers from such a big cast but here goes! The wizards played by Sam Harris (Schmerlin = evil) and Mike Searson (Werlin = good) did a great job. Harris possibly had the edge, but evil is so much cooler! Little Red (Zoe Muller) did really well and I loved the pigs (Angus Lange, Ayisha Pauli, Ayla Rodriguez) and their chase with the Wolf (Nathan Seyd) was hilarious.
Snow White (Ainslie Casbolt) and the dwarfs (Ellie Bickerton Olivia Brito, Lelia Clendon, Amelia French, Georgia Nadebaum, Gabe Neilson and Erica Tilson) played out their scenario well, but when the Wicked Queen/Witch (Maisie Fabry) got together with the evil Wizard the fun really got going. Cinderella (Marina Deller-Evans) was more than ably assisted by Meow, her cat, (Jean Collins) who stole the scene.
There were many memorable characters, from a very expressive toy (who I can’t name because the makeup hid her identity) and a beautiful Tinkerbell (Zanny Edhouse) to an angry pixie (Kate Johnson) who made me laugh.
The makeup and costume team should also be commended, so many pretty fairies so many expressive animals, not to mention a very smart Wolf! With the bright and colourful sets this was a production that will give all its participants wonderful memories and hopefully a love of the theatre. It will also give the many parents and other relatives a reason to be proud, as well as giving audiences a fun night out.
