Jack and the Beanstalk

The story started with some great poetic prologue from the good fairy and the wicked fairy. Both had fabulous costumes. The good fairy in her white dressw ith lots of sparkles and fairy lights. The wicked fairy with a green face and elaborate black costume.  

We are welcomed to the village of Old Windy Bottom to meet the larger tha nlife Dame Dotty Dimple. Being at least 6 feet tall, she dominated the stage and captivated the audience. She had an array of colourful costumes and fabulous makeup. Her sons Jack and Simple Simon were played well with great attention to detail to show their different personalities. 

Snatchet and Scarper(the henchmen) had a comedic entrance with Scarper pushing Snatchet in on sack trucks. We also enjoyed their song and dance routine with boss Rancid. All three characters were thoroughly engrossed into their parts and drew the audience in. 

The Kind and Queen played their parts well being part snobbish and part down to earth. They bring their beautiful daughter Princess Charlotte into the village where she meets Jack. Both are instantly smitten. Both sang beautifully in their duet. 

Dotty Dimple decides they must sell the family cow Buttermilk. There was agreat comedy scene with the pantomime cow producing powdered milk in a tin and and empty tin(evaporated milk). Simon swaps Buttermilk for a bag of beans from Rancid. The good fairy tries to help the situation by turning them into magic beans. 

Dotty and Simon decide to do some baking. We were delivered some corny jokes, lots of eggs and flour flying around, but a great deal of comedy.

The magic beans are thrown away and the beanstalk grows right up to Gutbuster’s castle. Gutbuster, the giant was a large powerful character who lolloped around the stage, with his enormous feet. This was played really well. 

Princess Charlotte is kidnapped and taken to the castle. So Jack, followed by all the others, climbs the beanstalk to rescue her. Charlotte sang a lovely version of “Somewhere only we know”.The princess is rescued and they all head back down the beanstalk before chopping it down. 

There were lovely renditions of “Colour my world” and “the Greatest Show”where Jack’s voice excelled and delighted the audience. 

Snatchet and Scarper joined Simple Simon for the audience participation song of “Dotty Dimple had a farm”. 

The finale was excellent with “You can’t stop the beat” and cast members taking their bows. The show was full of great singing and choreography. Costumes were bright and eye catching. The set was simple but effective with a nice touch of smoke machine to enhance the scenes. I particularly liked the way the beanstalk grew up to the sky. This was really well made and very effective. A special well done to the chorus who had numerous costume changes and were an asset to the production. 

Well done to all the cast and crew for a fabulous performance. Thank you so much for inviting me and I look forward to your next production.

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