The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

Based on C. S. Lewis’s first tale from The Chronicles of Narnia and adapted by Irita Kutchmy The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe musical has some lovely songs (also by Irita Kutchmy).  The title song in particular.  It is a delightful tale for both children and adults showing how evil is overcome by goodness.  It tells of four evacuees sent to safety to escape war-torn London.

The first big test with the show is how to create three believable settings on an extremely small village hall stage.  Enter the person responsible for set design and construction Rick Forward.  This was a very clever set.  Stage left was the spare room in the Professor’s house complete with wardrobe. Right was Mr Tumnus’s Cave, leaving the main stage as the Wood in Narnia.  Each setting was totally believable.  I was intrigued as to how Lucy was going to get out through the wardrobe and into the wood but it was done very cleverly and smoothly. In fact the same went for the transformation of the wood from winter to spring.  Even the Stone Table collapsed at exactly the right point.  Take a bow Mr Forward.

Unfortunately there were one or two technical problems on the first night with the sound, caused in the main by radio-mikes either not working or not switched on.  This meant that MD Maria McElroy’s excellent five-piece band overwhelmed the singers. I encounter this problem a lot and whilst I do appreciate young voices are helped by the use of radio-mikes, all the effort put in by them counts for nothing if they can’t be heard. There is no doubt in my mind that every single one of the cast knew the words to the songs but much was lost. 

The children are of course central to the production and they were convincingly played by Daniel Golding capable as Peter, the eldest and most sensible, Chelsea Booth confident as the wiser and caring Susan, a strong and able performance came from young Mia Turner as the inquisitive Lucy, and this District’s NODA Young Performer of 2013 George Harrison excellent as Edmund. They were all very good and also very confident with their songs.   Miss Booth in particular has an extremely fine voice.

In the fantasy world Jack Byng (Mr Tumnus) was a lively faun nicely creating the link between the two worlds.  Thomas Goodearl and Sue Caller were a very effective combination as Mr and Mrs Beaver. I loved the interpretation that Mr Goodearl, in particular, gave to Mr Beaver. Good character work here.

Becky Green made a formidable White Witch with good stage presence and interpretation of the character - a pretty scary Queen of Narnia.  

With a host of well-portrayed animal characters in support and with a wonderful Aslan worthy of Warhorse this musical version of the story had something of interest from start to finish

As well as the clever set, Sheila Goodall’s creative costumes and masks were first-class augmented by Karen Booth’s skilful make-up. There was not a lot of space to execute the choreography by Becky Green and Nikki Dyer but it was nevertheless well handled.

Overall, Director Karen Booth excelled herself with this production.  This was a brave and adventurous project directed with ingenuity.  Her sons of Adam and daughters of Eve are a talented bunch who all did her proud, thus making the sound problems all the more regrettable.

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