THE WIND IN THE WILLOWS. To 14 February.

Leeds

THE WIND IN THE WILLOWS
by Kenneth Grahame adapted by Alan Bennett Additional Lyrics and music by Jeremy Sams

West Yorkshire Playhouse Quarry Theatre To 14 February 2004
Mon-Thu 7pm, Fri-Sat 7.30pm no performance 15,25 December, 1,12 January, no evening performance 24,31 December
Mat 17,18,20,23,27,30 December, 2,3,8,10,14,15,17,22,24,29,31 January, 5,7,12,14 February 1.30pm
Audio-described 5,19 January,8,31 January 1.30pm
Captioned 7 February 1.30pm
BSL Signed 22 January 7pm, 30 January 7.30pm
Runs 2hr 50min One interval

TICKETS: 0113 213 7700
www.wyp.org.uk
Review: Timothy Ramsden 13 December

If you've a ticket, you're in for a treat. If you haven't, treat yourself and the people you like best.This production of Alan Bennett's National Theatre adaptation is part of artistic director Ian Brown's programme of work for families. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, has already been announced for Christmas 2004 - the Adrian Mitchell version well-worn by the Royal Shakespeare Company. The family-friendly policy needs to mean more than reviving big company cast-off adaptations of cosy old children's novels. Meanwhile, this Christmas-time show is perfect.

Bennett's beautifully catches the characters' social anthropomorphism. An excellently-played central quartet, plus various social animals, play on Dick Bird's hillsides, showing distant wild-wood and - distant, then close the imposing Toad Hall (it could be Toad Towers). A revolving central segment presents river bank and various characters' homes. Some characters tote musical instruments, the disruptive, fur-coated spiv-like Weasels, stoats and Ferrets swaggering to brass fanfares through the mellow melody of quieter, law-abiding creatures.

Christopher Pizzey's wandering, wondering Mole's a perfect picture of eternal gratitude. There's a sympathetic pleasure seeing this rudderless and utterly benevolent creature tucked up warm under Badger's quilt while his leader Ratty shivers with an inadequate blanket.

Ben Fox's super Rat's a gent to his plus-fours and sharp-edged Woosterish manner. They're perfectly matched by Cameron Blakely's officer-grade Badger, plump organisation ingrained in his efficient soul, and Malcolm Scates' equally - yet opposite unreflective Toad.

This happy act ends with Toad's hilarious trial Weasels etc producing suggestive nooses as Peter Laird's splendidly class-bound Magistrate comes to sentencing and Rat at home with Mole.

The exaggeratedly crowded courtroom, Laird and legal adviser looming over miserable Toad reminds (like Pickwick's imprisonment) how fear of social displacement runs under social comfort. In contrast is the snowy tableau which follows, In the Bleak Midwinter' carolled as Mole's shabby accommodation revolves to show lighted windows and smoking chimney making the humblest home a castle against cold nature and social displacement.

For act two, Bird strips the stage to its hilly borders, creating space for the farce of Toad's escape in Falstaffian drag - and the Christmas chase through the auditorium during the recapture of Toad Hall from the social upstarts. These fur-coated weasels, stoats and ferrets make up magnificent ensemble, each contributing precision-playing to etch moment-by-moment pictures and comic incident.

Directed by Ian Brown with splendid detail and sense of overall shaping, the show's a joy from first to last.

Mole: Christopher Pizzey
Rat: Ben Fox
Toad: Malcolm Scates
Badger: Cameron Blakely
Otter/Albert: Dominic Green
Rabbit Rose/Stoat Gerald/Clerk of Court: Sarah Hope
Rabbit Robert/Motorist Monica/Gaoler's Daughter: Sarah Moyle
Rabbit Ronald/Stoat Ian/Ticket Clerk: Matt Marks
Hedgehog Herbert/Stoat Stuart/Washerwoman: Katarina Olsson
Hedgehog Harold/Policeman: Juliet Leighton-Jones
Squirrel Samuel/Ferret Fred: Eleanor Brunsdon
Squirrel Shirley/Parkinson/Policeman: Lois Naylor
Squirrel Raymond/Fox/Bargewoman: Lisa Howard
Chief Weasel/Policeman: Ian Conningham
Weasel Norman/Motorist Rupert: Thomas Frere
Magistrate/Train Driver/Gypsy: Peter Laird
Woordland Creatures:
Holly Team: Rebecca Bouthron, Therese Carroll, Paige Drury-Lawrence, Seetal Gahir, Michaela Gettings, Shakiera Hill, Erin Laurenson, Rachael McCaul, Laura Pipe, Joseph Poulton, Victoria Sanderson, Nina Stead
Ivy Team: Manveer Batebajwe, Jessica Bradshaw, Joshua Buckle,Tanujja St Clair Clarke, Amelia Gill, Lucy Grant, Claire Howarth, Helen Hua, Miriam Middlehurst, Emily Stevens, Amanda Street, Joel Sutton

Director: Ian Brown
Designer: Dick Bird
Lighting: Neil Austin
Sound: Glen Massam
Musical Director/Arranger: Matt Marks
Movement: Faroque Khan
Voice coach: Susan Stern
Fight director: Renny Krupinski
Assistant director: Sarah Punshon

2003-12-14 12:09:26