Long Nose Puppets are in the magical business of taking children's favourite picture books and bringing them to life. This time it's Polly Dunbar's Penguin, acted with a cast of colourful puppets and set to music by Tom Gray of Gomez. If you don't know the book, it's the tale of Ben who gets a lovely big present, and inside is a penguin. But try as he might, Ben can't get his Penguin to speak, until it's almost too late... Some of Ben's tactics seem a little extreme - such as firing Penguin into space in a rocket - and I did begin to wonder what message it was sending out to selective mutes. But I needn't have worried - the show celebrates different ways of communicating, and Penguin gets to have his say in his own good time.
Long Nose Puppets have done a lovely job recreating the core characters. The Penguin is gorgeous, Ben is dressed just right, and is so expressive my 2 year old had no problem understanding him as a character. The Blue Lion is an extraordinary creation, and a good example of the sensitive adaptation - the book can get away with stating he's a blue lion and have done with it, but the play needs a little more backstory. So now he's from Harlem, and he likes Jazz. Extra characters, including some Martians and a Doctor, made sense for the storyline, and I was pleased to see the doctor was female. I'm pretty sure anyone who came already loving the book was pleased with the result.
The puppetry was quite amazing. The puppets have really movable faces, and can turn cartwheels, play music, and stick their tongues out with no problem. The martians had detachable eyes which did a dance all by themselves. I couldn't be sure how many puppeteers were there in the booth until they stood to take a bow. As well as puppetry they made excellent use of rapid real-time animation using cut-out shapes on an OHP machine. Is it time for an OHP revival?
I was personally less convinced by the music, which was very varied. There were some lovely tunes from some very different musical genres, but some of the songs expressed emotions which were really too adult (no, not like that!) especially the Penguin's song about all the things he hadn't said. The tone of regret was un-childlike. Having said that, while it might have passed over the little one's head, it certainly didn't detract from our overall enjoyment, and there were plenty of other songs to join in with.
The North Wall is terrific for children's shows. In shape, it has a small, comfy auditorium, with the benches around the edge perfect for shyer children to hide away a bit. Our small one, who has been known to watch entire shows with a look of horror frozen on his face, felt nice and safe here and began to join in lustily. Afterwards the chief characters came down into the auditorium to meet the kids, a nice touch and a really good beginning to the journey about understanding how theatre is put together, how fiction works, and perhaps the inspiration for a whole future generation of puppeteers.