DRAMA
W here might you find a remarkable menagerie including a chicken, badger, six monkeys, three each of foxes, rats and giants, conversational caterpillar, ladybird, centipede and spider, not to mention a pelican in cahoots with a giraffe? Where but in the Edward Alleyn Theatre, as the audience was immersed in the phantasmagorical world of Roald Dahl. This was especially apt since among 2016’s landmark anniversaries is the centenary of Dahl’s birth. Each House had been allotted a script from which to extract ten minutes of action; ninety boys rose to the challenge with infectious enthusiasm. Every scene had its own magical moments. Opening the spectacle were awesomely awful Aunts Spiker and Sponge (Lolly Witney-Low and Joshua Billington respectively) from whom James (Edward Cook) escapes with an enchanting entomological ensemble in Spenser’s James And The Giant Peach . George’s Marvellous Medicine was tonic for Jonson. It was notable for Charlie McNeill’s captivating cameo Chicken and the dynamically evil Grandma. Her larger-than-life meanness and fearless engagement with the audience earned the Best Actor cup for Zubayr Ghufoor. Scale can prove a problem in staging fantastical tales but Raleigh solved it skilfully by representing Sophie with a paper
REVIEW
A DAZZLING DAHL DELIGHT Lower School House Drama
Maggie Jarman Photographs by Fred Robb (Year 9)
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