The Magic Story Coat 2
As a sequel to The Magic Story Coat, The Magic Story Coat 2 - Battle of the Storytellers is fun holiday entertainment for the whole family. Based on a number of fractured fairytales and a coat with a mind of its own, this play sees the energetic Eric battle it out with the Storyteller for the prize of who tells the best stories. With guest appearances from the mischievous Rumpelstiltskin, the Emperor with his new clothes, the hairy Rapunzel and of course the misguided and misunderstood Big Bad Wolf - The Magic Story Coat 2 will be sure to entertain and amuse. For those game enough to join in, there will even be some fun storytelling games after the show!
Written by Michelle Gaul and Craig Higgs
Directed by Kevin Poynter
Starring
James Hart as Eric
Craig Higgs as The Storyteller
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Monday’s audience of small fry and accompanying parents quickly entered the madcap world of storytelling in which Hart and Higgs jousted for line honours in a potpourri of traditional fairy stories. The initial sequence, with Higgs attempting to rid the stage of the usurping Hart, set the tone for the show’s overall irreverence.
Equipped with guitar playing prowess, insouciance and a range of facial contortions, Hart basically served as fall guy to the vocally persuasive Higgs, the latter unleashing an amazing array of voice types to distinguish a gallery of storybook characters. Indeed the lively interplay between both actors made for fluent theatre of the apparently improvised variety.
Proof that Monday’s small fry were wholly drawn into the special world upfront lay in their readiness, when invited to do so, to offer advice. “Get off the stage” became a repeated chorus, potentially damaging for less experienced players than Higgs and Hart but on Monday taken genially on board.
Something here, too, for the adults, as when Higgs announced he was Raymond Q. Wolf, the “Q” attesting to skill at billiards, or when the same actor transformed himself vocally in to a fussy tailor to fashion the emperor’s new clothes. The “Three Little Pigs” sequence. Complete with cardboard cutouts of houses and characters, was delivered with breakneck abandon by Hart, who also displayed fetching winsomeness as Rapunzel, complete with thick yellow tresses.
This company is providing local children with essential theatre, setting off from well charted territory to explore the world of fantasy in a winning way. That children’s interest was held without elaborate stage trappings – Gaul’s simple backdrop yielded a necessary hint of antiquity, and the costumes were simple yet evocative – attested to effective storytelling.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is precisely what theatre’s all about!