THE SELFISH GIANT. To 7 January.

Glasgow

THE SELFISH GIANT
by Oscar Wilde

Arches Theatre To 7 January 006
various dates 10.30am, 1.30pm, 3.30pm
Runs 1hr No interval

TICKETS: 0870 240 7528
Review: Timothy Ramsden 16 December

Fun and feeling in a colourful production.
This isn't Scotland's first Selfish Giant. Annie Wood created a spare and elegant version for the very young at Stirling's Macrobert, before taking it with her to London's Polka. But Andy Arnold's new version, more robust and upfront in its humour, shows there's room for more than one Giant in this garden.

On Jeni Campbell's colourful, detailed set, with its prominent tree and semi-concealed lettering spelling 'Keep Out' (for the audience to discover), and accompanied by Alasdair Macrae's atmospheric music, Arnold offers plenty of opportunity for young audiences to call out and assist in the earlier part of the action. Allan Tall's masked Giant remains slow-thinking and deliberate in movement, rightly being off-putting rather than frightening (in the end, the character's going to call for sympathy more than opprobrium).

The show's highlight though, is the set of four puppet children, with their rhyming names and childlike impatience with the adult Narrator who fails to learn their nomenclature instantaneously. Skilfilly operated by the 2 Garden Creatures, these four realistically squabble and continue showing their responses to the Giant's exclusion zone by expressive head movements from the side of the stage.

trane house red's lighting finely contrasts the perpetual winter created by the Giant's frosty way with the warmth of spring and summer that's also indicated in the big man's absence by creatures hovering over audience heads. It's altogether a joyful occasion, yet one that's mostly not afraid to explore deeper emotions of pleasure and sadness, disappointment and joy.

It's only in the insistence on avoiding Wilde's specific Christ-child references (making it presumably a Midwinter rather than a Christmas show) that Arnold effectively bowdlerises Wilde. The lonely child's eventual leading of the aged Giant up into his own Garden is given a burst of literal theatre fireworks, but dramatically the moment's made bland by the deliberate blurring of direct religious reference.

This apart, the Arches has a fine, well-performed show to delight and resonate with young audiences. The 3+ age-range certainly goes as young as the piece can take, but, alongside Wood's adaptation, this adaptation shows how open a classic remains to creative responses.

Narrator: Stewart Ennis
Frost/Garden Creature: Izzi Joss
Snow/Garden Creature: Laura Cameron-Lewis
Giant/Musician: Allan Tall
Musician/Assistant Narrator: Alasdair Macrae

Direrctor: Andy Arnold
Designer/Costume: Jeni Campbell
Lighting: trane house red
Music arranger: Alasdair Macrae

2005-12-21 10:51:37