HONK!

Honk! retells the Hans Christian Anderson story of The Ugly Duckling.  It was originally written for adults to perform but over the years youth groups have taken it on board.  The main problem with this is that, the young people do not understand many of the lines, they are not inappropriate, just a different type of language and humour; with this production care had been taken to explain the importance of the lines and the adults in the audience were given time to respond.

The set had been well designed, with fixed set with different levels on the main part of the stage, with a pull-out section under the raised area.  It worked well with all the scene changes happening smoothly.  The back wall was plain enabling it to be used for floods of colour to change the atmosphere.  There were some good lighting effects, which worked well.  I liked the red, white and blue for ‘The Wild Goose Chase’.  There were good well-cued sound effects such as children playing and dogs barking, which put the birds and animals into the larger world outside the duckyard.  The sound balance between voices and musicians was good and all the microphones were well operated and well cued.  The costumes worked well making the different birds and animals easily identifiable. The transformations for Bullfrog and Ugly were well done. 

There was interesting and appropriate choreography, the little fish ‘swam’ well and I really enjoyed the Froglets tap dance, it had simple steps which everyone could perform was well co-ordinated and very effective.  The snowflakes were lovely in the storm scene.  The show has many really nice songs some of which are quite difficult to sing but none of them are well known.  Musical Director, Kayley Prior, had worked hard with the young people and they had achieved a good standard of singing and clear diction.  The musicians and voices were always together.

The principals captured the traits of the characters they were portraying really well, everyone was confident in their roles, with Drake showing little interest in his offspring until forced to and setting the scene beautifully at the beginning.  The ensemble also showed their characters well and supported the principals and the action, helping bring the story to life.

Directors Heather and Mark Collins had worked hard with the young people helping them to understand their characters and the show and creating a cohesive unit with everyone working well together.  They had some lovely ideas such as the use of the blue fabric for water and the ducklings going down into it and learning to swim, it was a lovely moment; also the snowstorm was very effective.

Everyone did very well on this very hot summer’s afternoon and kept their concentration, entertaining your audience very well.  Well done everyone.

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