Pinocchio, Royal Lyceum Edinburgh (web version)
| 11 Jan 2007
The Lyceum puts on a good show, puts on a good show. Robert Hopkin's set – a tribute to Spanish proto-surrealist De Chirico's stark village squares with inky black archways - was a nicely atmospheric starting point for any production.
Director Mark Thomson's adaptation paid close attention to Carlo Collodi's original Tuscan tale, and on the whole gave full rein to the enchanted cast of characters that populate this classic children's tale. That's not to say Thomson was duty bound to slavishly copy the original. Disney's classic animation played fast and loose with the story and is widely recognised as a masterpiece of the animator's art.
But to prevent any embarrassing nasal growth spurts at Skinny Towers, we should note that not everything attempted here came off with equal aplomb. The script was patchy – some of the jokes were, dare I say it, wooden and lacked the spark that has ignited Collodi's tale in the imaginations of generations of children the world-over. Indeed at times, the children in the audience only mumbled through their participatory lines and even with the adults mugging along bravely – BEHIND YOU! – elements of this otherwise fine production fell flat. In particular, using a chorus of storytellers to propel the plot seemed unnecessary and was an unwelcome interruption. Better perhaps to rely on Collodi's archetypal characterisations to bring the story to life.
That said, Malcolm Shield's choreography was brilliantly realised and some stellar individual performances more than made up for the occasional narrative device gone awry. Molly Innes as the cat was superb, barely able to wipe her cream-soaked whiskers between sinister asides and was the perfect foil to Andrew Clark's equally dastardly fox. Other cameo roles such as Matthew Pidgeon's stubbornly fish-fixated Green Fisherman also hit all the right notes.
So then, Lyceum's Pinocchio was an unqualified success. Woops, my nose just got a little longer.
Director Mark Thomson's adaptation paid close attention to Carlo Collodi's original Tuscan tale, and on the whole gave full rein to the enchanted cast of characters that populate this classic children's tale. That's not to say Thomson was duty bound to slavishly copy the original. Disney's classic animation played fast and loose with the story and is widely recognised as a masterpiece of the animator's art.
But to prevent any embarrassing nasal growth spurts at Skinny Towers, we should note that not everything attempted here came off with equal aplomb. The script was patchy – some of the jokes were, dare I say it, wooden and lacked the spark that has ignited Collodi's tale in the imaginations of generations of children the world-over. Indeed at times, the children in the audience only mumbled through their participatory lines and even with the adults mugging along bravely – BEHIND YOU! – elements of this otherwise fine production fell flat. In particular, using a chorus of storytellers to propel the plot seemed unnecessary and was an unwelcome interruption. Better perhaps to rely on Collodi's archetypal characterisations to bring the story to life.
That said, Malcolm Shield's choreography was brilliantly realised and some stellar individual performances more than made up for the occasional narrative device gone awry. Molly Innes as the cat was superb, barely able to wipe her cream-soaked whiskers between sinister asides and was the perfect foil to Andrew Clark's equally dastardly fox. Other cameo roles such as Matthew Pidgeon's stubbornly fish-fixated Green Fisherman also hit all the right notes.
So then, Lyceum's Pinocchio was an unqualified success. Woops, my nose just got a little longer.