Alice in Wonderland - Liverpool Playhouse / TR Plymouth(?)

No expense spared on the graphics it seems. All of 3 minutes spent in paint. Vile.

Sounds utterly, utterly horrific

A few thoughts about the 1st preview. Unfortunately, this really didn't do a lot for me I'm sorry to say. The Wonder.land tour with Kerry Ellis and Wendy Peters a few years back was more enjoyable than this. It is very much a 90's music vibe-based show (we even had a bit of a prologue at the start explaining to the younger audience what a cassette and tape player is as it is key to the story). It's an actor-musician styled show though seeing someone dressed as a rabbit playing the drums is something else. In the show's defence, I will say that the singing and instrument playing from the cast were the few positives from this show.

The premise of the show is that Alice is transported into this stero recorder world of Wonderland to battle it out against the Queen of Charts as she tries to find her Dad. The classic Lewis Carroll characters have been very much updated in this show with a more techy appearance/names. The basic story of Alice in Wonderland is there but that is about it.

Set wise, the main piece that dominates the stage is a big tape player that has been dismantled with bits of wires attached. You get other bits of props to flesh the stage out but nothing fancy. Even with a key scene like the Mad Hatters tea party, you get a pull-out table with cardboard cut-outs of bits of food attached by supporting wires. The Cheshire cat is a guy dressed up in a big pink fluffy costume, so this is where we are at this show. For me there was nothing magical about how this was staged. Also, I don't ever recall the novel or the Disney film having a robot in it, but in this show we do.

On the score, it is very much as I've said a 90's vibe with a mix of pop, ballads and rap. I thought it was ok at best within the show but nothing that has stuck with me as I left the theatre. Vocally those cast members who sang were fine with Leanne Jones as the Queen of Charts being the standout for me in this area. Unfortunately, there were no programmes on offer so I can't offer any song list.

Whilst I may not have got much out of this, there were plenty of young school kids in tonight who really enjoyed it so it will probably go down well with that age group. I will say that a 7pm start time (with a 2hr run time incl interval) was very much welcomed and we got out just after 9pm tonight.