Yesterday, Alfie, Kitty and I trooped off to Brighton Dome for Stuff and Nonsense’s production of classic tale The Enormous Turnip. We arrived to find one of the two main characters, Raymond Chickweed, wandering around the foyer, chatting to people and playing his accordion. On entering the auditorium his on-stage wife, Dotty, came and asked us if we’d seen him and if he’d bought dog food. Alfie looked at me with a grin and I knew we were in for a fun afternoon. The set was minimal but packed with detail and the performances were impeccable, as was the puppetry. I loved Scruffy the dog, while Alfie’s favourite was the singing cauliflower (oh yes). You’ll be familiar with the tale, but this version has some lovely twists that make it just as palatable for adults as little people. In fact, it’s packed with grown-up in-jokes referencing Lassie and alluding to unintentional mishaps. The audience participation was great – in fact, Alfie was a bit miffed his ‘Me, me, me’ hand-in-the-air didn’t win him a place on the stage to help pull the turnip out.
He spent much of the show entranced (see above) by the action and belly laughing at the silly songs and dancing. Kitty was mesmerised by the first half and slept through most of the extremely noisy second. The actors handled the ultra-enthusiastic audience superbly, particularly the post-performance mobbing of Beatlemania proportions in the foyer. An enjoyably raucous hour and a half I’d recommend to anyone. Catch it at The Arts Depot from Thursday or on tour at various venues in the north – see our preview for details.
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