As someone who grew up in the eighties, I have deeply fond memories of watching the BBC’s serialised version of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Just hearing the theme tune is enough to transport me straight back to childhood, and while time has not been kind to the show—indeed, some of its costumes and special effects look laughably bad now—it still occupies a place in my heart.
Even better, of course, is the original novel, which I read when I was eight or nine, and I still regard the famous scene in which Lucy—the youngest of the Pevensie children—pushes past the fur coats hanging in a seemingly ordinary wardrobe to enter an enchanted world of perpetual snow as one of the most magical reading experiences of my life.
Suffice to say, as a former member of the Narnia Fan Club (I filled in a form and got sent some stickers in the post), any staging of C S Lewis’s imperishable fantasy novel will have its work cut out for to measure up. Fortunately, this production—which I originally saw in 2017 under Sally Cookson’s direction and then again in the West End under Michael Fentiman’s—is a lovingly crafted recreation of the classic tale.
Set during the Second World, the Pevensie children—two boys and two girls—are evacuated out of Blitz-era London to an isolated house in Scotland, owned by an ancient and kindly professor (Kraig Thornber). At one point, Lucy (Kudzai Mangombe) wanders away from her siblings and discovers a portal to Narnia upon entering a wardrobe. Whilst there, she encounters a faun, Mr Tumnus (Alfie Richards), who warns her of the White Witch (Katy Stephens). Later, Lucy’s brother Edmund (Bunmi Osadolor)—a stubborn and selfish boy—also finds himself in Narnia, where he encounters Narnia’s terrifying queen for himself.
Once all four children have entered Narnia—including the two elder siblings, Peter (Jesse Dunbar) and Susan (Joanna Adaran)—they become embroiled in a grand fight between good and evil, with the magical lion Aslan (Stanto Wright) symbolising all that is virtuous and worth fighting for.
When translating a beloved fantasy novel to the stage, it’s imperative that the adaptors manage to retain the original’s sense of magic. For the most part, Fentiman’s production achieves this through an imaginative combination of music, lighting, practical effects and puppetry. I should state though that many of the production’s most striking moments—including a sequence in which the White Witch slowly levitates, her white dress billowing out to reveal a magic lantern of nightmarish creatures—are taken directly from Cookson’s original production at the Leeds Playhouse in 2017, but Fentiman also introduces many flourishes of his own.
While I preferred the original production, which was staged in the round, I appreciate the striking design of Tom Paris’s set, which is dominated by a giant clock face, underlying the time disparity between Narnia and our world. Max Humphries’s puppets are impressive, most notably Aslan, who brings to mind the title puppet from War Horse. That being said, while I can understand the reasons behind having both an actor and a puppet share the role—to underline the lion’s mixture of human compassion and animal wildness—I would have preferred it if Aslan has been embodied purely as a puppet.
The score, composed by Barnaby Rice and Benji Bower, succeeds in creating different moods—from the folky songs of the forest-dwellers to the sinister music which accompanies the White Witch—despite lacking catchy, memorable tunes.
The Pevensie children are well performed by Joanna Adaran, Jesse Dunbar, Kudzai Mangombe and Bunmi Osadolor. Unlike Lyra in Philip Pullman’s fantasy trilogy His Dark Materials, the Pevensie brood are not the most lively or independent-minded of child protagonists, but the four performers do a fine job of portraying the petty squabbles and underlying affection that characterise most sibling relationships.
Katy Stephens is delightfully haughty and imperious as the White Witch, introducing a genuine sense of menace to the stage whenever she appears. Also frightening is Shane Antony-Whitely as Maugrim, the witch’s lupine henchman, who brings great athleticism to the part, charging across the stage on hand stilts.
Ed Thorpe and Anya de Villiers invest the roles of Mr and Mrs Beaver with considerable warmth, as does Alfie Richards as Mr Tumnus.
Putting aside my few minor quibbles, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is a beautifully realised Christmas show and an ideal one for parents who wish to introduce their children to the magic of theatre.