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Christmas?  Bah humbug!

 This is not the musical, instead an adaptation by Deborah McAndrew, directed by Sarah Brigham, of Dickens’ classic tale incorporating traditional tunes and original songs, played   and performed onstage by the cast, Eliza Waters realises it all as Music Director

McAndrew first came to my attention, and I suspect, of many others, via her sparkling characterisation of Angie Freeman in Coronation Street in the 1990s. Subsequently her greater talents have been manifested by  a series of  successful original and adapted stage productions; Hard  Times, A Christmas Carol and the Great Gatsby amongst them.

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Oliver, born and orphaned on Christmas Eve,  sets out to find his family in time for Christmas  in Victorian London set mainly in the backstreets of the East End , not Belgravia. Neil Irish’s set is warm, impressive and flexible, Tim Heywood’s costuming a visual delight.

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 The opening   “In The Bleak Midwinter” sets a sombre tone. Polly Lister,  reinvents the role of Fagin, a tragic figure doomed and damned  . Clever- but not clever enough to dodge her fate.

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Iris Laverne  also reinvents the  Artful Dodger as does Michael Mahony as Mr Bumble. But traditionalists should not be worried. Analiese Emerson Guettinger  is a classically  comely Nancy  who loves bad boy Bill Sykes.   Dan McGarry  relishes  his brutish   role as villain in chief Sykes.

This production runs for the entire festive period necessitating a large child ensemble cast who performed energetically and with vim and brio on the night. Claudia Burton, Eliza Jean Poxon and William Poyser Alton take the roles of Oliver over the run. Eliza played Oliver on the night, slight, shy, and convincing.

  Deb Pugh as movement director has the unenviable job of harnessing all that  youthful energy which she succeeds in .  Ian Stapleton delivers distanced non contact violence which is strangley harrowing as a result as Fight Director. Most impressively Anita Gilbert ensures authentic London accents and dialects as voice and accent coach. Arnim Friess shrewdly alternates the lighting from dingy backstreets to bright lights

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Although the happy ending for Oliver saves the day the grime, poverty ,  crime and violence of the time is never far away and looms omnipresent. Age guidance is for the over eights. McAndrew’s script is a story of  a child’s resilience and the triumph of the  human spirit as Oliver navigates his place and role  in a harsh, often hostile,  world , it also begs the question of how far removed today’s child poverty is from that of the 19^th century. Wily McAndrew and Brigham contrive a suitably festive finale for a show which was warmly applauded on a cold Friday night by a full house.

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Fagin picks a pocket or two until 3^rd January