The Big Imaginations Children’s Theatre Festival, from next Friday to November 3, finds UK and international talent taking centre stage for a celebration of children’s theatre at a string of venues big and small right across the region.
Festival programmer Zoe Pickering says: “A couple of years ago Liz O’Neill at Z-arts realized that provision of children’s theatre and its quality across the North West was not great really.
“The idea of commissioning partners came up and there are now 15 in the consortium and also associated venues, like The Lowry and the Royal Exchange who don’t necessarily need the money to commission or buy in work but have a lot of expertise and knowledge to offer.
“We have not only big theatres like The Dukes in Lancaster putting on shows but also little rural village halls, where people literally have to put the chairs out themselves.
Some of the shows, suitable for ages from two-year olds to pre-teens, include a chance to peek inside the magical pages of The Icebook, the world’s first projection-mapped pop-up book; a dripping, flowing, bubbling and fizzing celebration of water in H20, from the German company Helios; and the world première of Moonbird, a magical fable about a little Arabian prince, based on the book by Joyce Dunbar.
There’s also one-man wonder Tim Crouch reimagining Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night in I, Malvolio; and beloved tales brought colourfully to life in The Hare and the Tortoise and The Boy Who Cried Wolf.
Big Imaginations runs from October 18-November 3 as part of the Family Arts Festival.