The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe -Leeds/Tour/GL/Brum

God forbid a London audience might be asked to empathise with northerners...

Your use of the word authentic excludes Jamie.

Sorry to say I found this to be one of the most intensely irritating evenings at the theatre I've experienced in a long time.

It couldn't make up its mind whether it wanted to be a genuine period piece - invoking the images of the evacuation in the 40s, or a 'woke' updated version of C.S. Lewis' regressive and problematic source.

It was colourful, beautifully designed and some great puppetry, but the acting across the board was mediocre at best.

Laura Elphinstone was horribly miscast as the White Witch, with none of the status or power that character needs. She shouted a lot, but there was no substance behind the performance: the very definition of going through the motions. She wasn't remotely scary - and her weak 'R's don't help.

Wil Johnson was OK as Aslan, but really dreadful as the Professor, and the four children ranged from not bad (Keziah Joseph's Lucy) to truly appalling (Femi Akinfolarin's Peter). Indeed, with his stilted delivery of every line, Akinfolarin was rivalling the wardrobe in the wooden stakes. And their accents wavered from RP to Northern to London throughout.

There was no real sense of adventure, and I found it a smug production rather too in love with its own cleverness. I couldn't wait to get out - and handing out hundreds of green slips for the audience to wave just made me think of its poor environmental credentials. (There was nowhere obvious to recycle these at the end of the show.)

2 stars would be generous.

Interesting to read the negativity on here. I love the book and the RSC production (seen it twice). Also love Cookson's work but when I saw the pics I thought Meh! I was thinking about cheapo days seats but maybe not now

When I saw it on Sunday afternoon, I enjoyed it and speaking to a couple of families during the interval and post show enjoyed it as well. The kids around me  where I was sat and those I could see in the stalls seemed to be entertained by the show. 

This had great reviews in its previous life.

They've probably started a £1 deposit because people were taking them home. The idea is to reduce plastic and not take them home with you, so they dont have to buy more from the manufacturer.

This is heading to The Lowry for seven weeks next Christmas. 9 December 2020 - 24 January 2021.

I'm seeing this tonight. Have not not yet read reviews so startled to see negativity here!
Bracing myself....

Anyone able to advise how the front row would be for this. It's £25 which is much cheaper than the rows behind. "Height of stage will cause restricted view"

I had forgotten this was Sally Cookson until I was mid-Act 1 and it just all felt very Peter Pan with the music and staging. And I liked bits of Peter Pan and didn't like other bits. And it turns out I liked bits of this and I didn't like other bits. I'm OK with adults playing the kids, and I'm OK with sightly home-made feel of the design, makeup and costumes. I'm guessing part of the way Cookson and co approach these plays is that there's a sense of it being a fancier version of kids dressing up, telling stories themselves, playing make-believe. That aesthetic means you can get away with a lot of things, particularly in stories with a huge amount of magic and fantasy thrown in. And actual children (not the pretend ones on stage) are obviously incredibly forgivable about such things, and so if some of us adults are a bit alienated at times by these choices it's probably not going to cause the production team to lose much sleep.

The things I really didn't like were The Professor (just pantomime, no gravitas, no mystery), the Witch (not even pantomime, too underpowered, not at all seductive or menacing) and Aslan. Aslan the puppet was great, the kids were oohing and aahing, he cuts quite a figure in his odd multicoloured way. Aslan the man was just... disappointing. I would rather they had downscaled the puppet a bit and just used that, rather than a man in a faux-fur coat. My other complaint is the same as with Peter Pan (although this made better use of it) - the music. I am a massive musical fan, I am less a fan of plays that have 3 or 4 songs shoehorned in, such that they neither feel like a musical, nor a play with music. And if you're going to have 4 songs being sung on stage, then they have to be absolute corkers, not the wishy washy pieces we got in this. Peter Pans music was even worse so we're at least improving on that front.

The scope and ingenuity of how some of this was put on was impressive, and actually the storytelling overall ends up being quite effective. There are just so many bits and pieces in the mix which aren't good enough for me to have walked out of this feeling enthused and bewitched and all the things a play set in Narnia should achieve. I imagine if I was a kid I would have liked this more, but I'm a sucker for a family show, so it's really disappointing I didn't find more to love in it.

I liked it but not loved it.
It's a very enjoyable, beautifully staged and heartwarming show but the magic was just not there for me. Of course, Sally Cookson is a fantastic director and I'm a big fan of her concoctions of drama, physical theatre, circus and puppetry, and I bawled my eyes out watching "A Monster Calls" but... I don't know. Something was missing.
Maybe I'm too old.