Doctor Dolittle

The story of Doctor Dolittle is an easy story for anyone of any age to understand, the Doctor can converse in nearly 500 dialects, and he gets on better with animals than people. His parrot ‘Polynesia’ teaches him animal languages so he decides to become an animal doctor, but he stands trial for the murder of an unknown women by throwing her into the sea. He denies this charge stating it wasn’t a woman but a seal. He decides to go on a voyage to look for ‘The Great Pink Sea Snail’, so during the show the story keeps going back to the court room. I thought that Steve Dobson as Doctor Dolittle did a great job, his singing was good and he created a sympathetic but commanding character, the audience were really enjoying these well known songs, ‘Talk To the Animals’, ‘Never Seen Anything Like It’ were all well received. In the super part of ‘Polynesia’ the parrot, played excellently by Caitlin Bibby, she looked resplendent in her red costume. All the animals moved around in character I expect there were many laughs in rehearsals as the cast of animals talked to each other. The animals nearly stole the show from the humans!

Other notable performances came from Chris Metcalf as Matthew Mug the doctors Irish friend, he sang well and Lou Wareing playing Emma Fairfax was lovely. There were so many memorable characters throughout this story, so well done.

The chorus and everyone looked good in their costumes, what can I say about the super set except fantastic, congratulations to the set designer and all the crew for making this a show full of colour and creating such magical creatures your hard work paid off, and not forgetting director Christine Bell for putting all this together. The musicians were great as were sound and lighting. A jolly good evening’s entertainment. Thank you.

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