Roaming in the gloaming

A bishop ate my jelly baby and refused to cackle. But more on that in a moment.

The fates decided to show me some leniency after all. Thank you fates. The theatre company was only too happy to offer me tickets for tonight's performance after yesterday's literal washout. Not only that, but the beautiful summer night I'd expected the previous day turned up at last - it was a glorious evening. Weather reports threated stormy weather at random points throughout the day, but these managed to hold off until the very last tonight. In short, things were just how they should have been yesterday.

The play itself was well put together and faithful to it's source material (from what I remember at least, it's been some 15 years since I last read the book). Parents of you children should be warned that it is perhaps a trifle long, given the attention spans of much of it's target audience, but it felt just right for me. The cast were uniformly excellent, throwing themselves into their parts with enormous enthusiasm and handling some of Lewis Caroll's torturous verses with aplomb (including the punishing Jabberwocky, which itself made an impressive entrance at the end). I almost felt sorry for Alice, since she alone had to restrain herself as the sole voice of reason in the topsy turvy looking glass world, but she came across as being likeably down to earth nevertheless (especially in comparison with her plummy voiced Disney counterpart). As I mentioned yesterday, each scene took place in a new location in the park, and the audience had to dutifully uproot themselves and play follow the leader each time a scene change took place. It was a somewhat unusual experience, but the crowd took to it with good spirits and it's testimony to someone's organisational skills that moving such a large volume of people, including a considerable number of children, was accomplished swiftly and with a minimum of fuss. As the evening drew on, and dusk descended into twilight, the routes were lit with candles and torches and the atmosphere became increasingly surreal, almost dreamlike, which suited the mood perfectly.

Along with the torches and lanterns, several small vignettes were performed by a few characters en route, to help guide the audience along the correct paths. Most amusing of these was a small congregation of bishops (replete with mitres and placards) protesting their lack of representation in the play when compared with the other chess pieces . They also turned up to amuse the audience during the interval, and to harass me a little as I was trying to teach a Spanish lady the correct way to eat jelly babies. Which is. of course. to throw your head back whilst cackling loudly before devouring the jelly baby whole (it's important to feel no remorse as you do so. It may be difficult at first, but with time and practice you can overcome this initial emotional hurdle). The bishop took my jelly baby, but refused to cackle, declaiming that such behaviour was not befitting a clergy member of his standing, before biting the jelly baby's legs off - which, as everyone knows, is the cruelest way to eat them.

Some people have no respect for tradition.

Anyway, almost enough fun was had to make up for yesterday's drenching, and the whole experience gets my hearty recommendation.