The Enormous Crocodile at Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre Review
Written by Clare for Theatre & Tonic
Disclaimer: Gifted tickets in exchange for an honest review
With the Summer holidays coming to a close, Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre have the perfect way to round off the last six weeks with their production of The Enormous Crocodile. Based on Roald Dahl’s book, this show brings to life with amazing puppetry, dazzling costumes and a few secret plans and clever tricks.
Creatively, it was very clever, book writer and lyricist Suhayla El-Bushra and composer Ahmed Addullahi Gallab making it accessible to both small kids and big kids such as myself. Another favourite for me came from the set and costumes (designed by Fly Davis) and the larger than life puppets (designed by Toby Olie) which delighted the audience with their vibrancy and creativity, transporting us out of London and into the jungle.
The five strong cast worked excellently together to take on a multitude of characters from the smallest bug to the biggest crocodile (the enormous crocodile…should I say?) as well as humans too. Taya Ming played the crafty crocodile with style and cunning, Muggle-Wump the Monkey (Siobhan Athwal) another favourite of mine and the nervous Humpy Rumpy the Hippopotamus (Ryan Crellin-Simpson) brought lots of laughs from the audience due to his nervous belly. The cast was completed by Trunky the Elephant (Nia Stephen) and the glamourous Roly Poly Bird (Alison Arnopp) who both were excellent. The entire cast worked amazingly together to make the show very fun and super engaging.
The show is 55 minutes with no interval, which was short, concise and action-packed. Complete with chances for audience participation, this show is a perfect introduction to theatre for any child, whether young or old.
The Enormous Crocodile is at Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre until 7th September
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
