BWW Reviews: THE WIND IN THE WILLOWS Is A Delightful Performance in the Park To Entertain Children Of All Ages This Summer

Saturday 10 January 2015, Royal Botanic Gardens, Sydney

The Australian Shakespeare Company's THE WIND IN THE WILLOWS is a wonderful family afternoon in the park with Kenneth Grahame's classic characters.

This review is prefaced with the acknowledgement that only 30 minutes of the show was viewed as the performance was stopped due to rain.

Of what we did get to see, it was clear that Glenn Elston (Artistic Director) and Marian Bragge's (Director) version of THE WIND IN THE WILLOWS is a crowd pleaser for children and adults. The audience is welcomed by Head Chief Rabbit Nicholas Gell in big fluffy ears poking out of his hat and white tail coat and fluffy bunny tail who sets the tempo by advising the audience that they are all rabbits and gets the audience, young and old, involved with a singalong.

Head Chief Rabbit is joined by Weasel (Andrew Steel) who, after eyeing off the young rabbits (audience) as a tasty treat, as Weasels are the Rabbit's natural predator, joins Head Chief Rabbit in song. The confident Rabbit and Weasel are joined by the timid Mole (Sarah Wadsley), carefree Ratty (Jono Freeman), reclusive old Badger (Warwick Allsopp), eccentric Toad (Douglas Hansell) and Otter (Tim Harding) and young otter Portly (various: Rupert Gillies, Finnley Lambert, Ava Sutton).

The action first takes place beside the lake in the Royal Botanic Gardens to reflect the riverside setting of the story and utilises the water with Ratty "simply messing about in boats" and Toad trying out his latest fad of canoeing. Rabbit, Weasel and Ratty provide accompaniment to musical numbers with guitars. The music ranges from easy melodies for children to join in with and other genres to provide variety. Gell and Steel's vocals are strong and project well in the open air environment.

Whilst the show is primarily geared to capture the younger audience's imagination, the older audience is catered to through quick little quips that sail over younger heads but engage the adults. Whilst Rabbit and Weasel are not required on "stage", they mingle through the seated audience, sitting amongst the audience and enthralling children, and rifling through picnic baskets.

The costuming draws on the anthropomorphisim by keeping the characters in human clothes, each costume having a colour tone in keeping with the character, and ears out of hats, tails out of pants and painted faces to define the animal. Weasel wears an orange shirt and a big tail whilst reclusive grumpy Badger wears a dark smoking jacket style robe and uses a walking stick and Otters are in sleek black with life saving caps and swimming shorts and flippers.

Whilst the show ended early, it showed promise of wonderful entertainment filled with whimsy and wonder that would keep both the children and adults engaged.

For children this looks like a wonderful introduction to a classic story. For adults, this is a chance to relive their childhood and reconnect with the fantasy land they probably read in their younger days.

THE WIND IN THE WILLOWS

Royal Botanic Garden, Sydney

Harbour Side of the Main Pond

7 - 24 January 2015

11am and 6pm Wednesday - Saturday (no 6pm performance on Friday 16 January 2015)

The Australian Shakespeare Company's cancellation policy is that if a performance is cancelled due to weather, tickets will be valid for another performance during the same production season.

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