THE WOLVES IN THE WALLS. To 20 May.

London/Scotland.

THE WOLVES IN THE WALLS
by Julian Crouch, Vicky Featherstone, Nick Powell, Neil Galman from the book by Neil Galman and Dace McKean.

Improbable Theatre/ National Theatre of Scotland Tour to 20 May 2006.
Runs 1hr 15min No interval.
Review: Timothy Ramsden 6 April at Tramway Glasgow.

Scotland’s National Theatre includes inventive theatre for the young in its opening season.
Let’s hope the National Theatre of Scotland can hang on to both the artistic and financial levels of its opening season, which shows it much better fitted to Scotland’s demography and potential audiences than its older relative, London’s (and, supposedly, Great Britain’s) South Bank repertory company. Though this ‘musical pandemonium’ finds it collaborating with the not noticeably Scottish Improbable Theatre, the NTS brings the company’s visual inventiveness to Scottish venues, alongside Improbable’s familiar London home, the Lyric Hammersmith.

Improbable work in their individual manner around what’s been called total, physical or visual theatre (or performance; labels struggle to define the practice), producing a treasurable piece for young people over 7 (it’s a mite dark and creepy for the very young) and adults. Based on a graphic novel, the piece has Frances Thorburn’s friendly, strong-minded Lucy take us into her ordinary suburban home as its outline is sketched on a screen, through which various parts are briefly seen in 3D. And it all turns out far from the ordinary.

Mixing speech and song in its rapid storytelling, the play shows Lucy’s family, tuba-playing Dad, jam-making Mum (Iain Johnstone and Cora Bissett, respectively among Scotland’s most prominent acting musicians and musical actors) plus computer-game zapper brother (Ryan Fletcher), all too busy to heed her warnings, denying the night-time noises mean wolves in the walls. The plot here resembles a Scottish version of Friedrich Durrenmatt’s postwar Swiss drama The Fire Raisers, where a typical family is ‘in denial’ about the arsonists it harbours.

Once evicted by lupine attack, Lucy’s relatives sing of fantasy alternatives, living in the arctic, a desert, in space. It’s resolute Lucy’s determination to save her toy doll from the sharp-tooths that leads the family back within their own walls (literally within them at first).

There’s constant visual inventiveness, both technological and in the uncuddly wolves, formed out of shaped fur wrapped round the actors. Thorburn is excellent, economically showing Lucy’s determined will when her family give way around her. Like Nick Powell’s score, the visual ingenuity always propels the story forward. Well worth seeing in London or Scotland.

Dad: Iain Johnstone.
Mum: Cora Bissett.
Lucy: Frances Thorburn.
Brother: Ryan Fletcher.
Wolves: Cait Davis, Ewan Hunter, Jessica Tomchack, Jason Webb.

Co-director: Vicky Featherstone.
Lighting: Natasha Chivers.
Co-director/Designer/Animations: Julian Crouch.
Sound/Music: Nick Powell.
Choreographer: Steven Hoggett.

2006-04-10 14:36:02