Joe Wright, the award-winning British director of films Atonement and Pride And Prejudice, is to return to the theatre his parents founded to direct a puppet show next year.
Wright, whose parents John and Lyndie Wright established Islington’s Little Angel puppet theatre in 1961, will team up with his mother and sister Sarah, along with members of acclaimed company Kneehigh, to stage a new puppet show inspired by a short story by Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
The show, which will be staged over Christmas 2011, is the culmination of the theatre’s 50th birthday celebrations, which will also include, in April, a new production of The Tempest in collaboration with the Royal Shakespeare Company. In August a team of trainee marionettists will bring back the theatre’s first ever production, the Edwardian farce The Wild Night Of The Witches. The celebrations continue with the announcement of the first annual Little Angel Puppetry Award – established to honour individuals who have made an outstanding contribution to UK puppetry – during the annual Suspense London Puppetry Festival in late October.
Before the anniversary season kicks off, the theatre delves into the weird and wonderful world of Lewis Carroll this Christmas with two festive shows based on his Alice In Wonderland.
The first, which takes the same title as Carroll’s much-loved novel, is a family show suitable for children aged five and older which recreates Alice’s encounters with the White Rabbit and the Cheshire Cat using Little Angel’s famous puppetry skills, an original score of witty songs and a hefty dose of nonsense.
Alongside Alice In Wonderland, the same creative team have devised a second seasonal show, Hold On Mr Rabbit!, for younger children aged two to five.
Also inspired by Carroll’s story and using some of the same puppets from the main production, Hold On Mr Rabbit! centres on young Elsie who wakes to find her cuddly toy rabbit climbing into a picture that hangs on her bedroom wall. Deciding to follow him and bring him home, Elsie makes her way through the topsy-turvy world she finds behind the picture frame.
Alice In Wonderland plays from 20 November to 30 January, while Hold On Mr Rabbit! runs from 8 to 30 December.
CB