SCISSORHANDZ

Southwark Playhouse Elephant

★★★

“The cast are superb across the board and there is an easy camaraderie that adds to the feelgood factor”

It is a bold statement to tag your show with the subtitle ‘A Musical Reinvented’. But there is nothing faint-hearted about Bradley Bredeweg’s reinterpretation of Tim Burton’s classic and gothic fairytale. Direct from Los Angeles, it bursts onto the London stage as though heading for Wembley Arena, but instead took a wrong turn and landed up in the three-hundred-seater, Southwark venue. Edward Scissorhands, the solemn and doleful outsider, has morphed into a rock legend of their own making – if only for a few fleeting seconds before retreating behind the bank of loudspeakers to await rediscovery.

The tale of an outsider trying to ‘fit in’ is an obvious celebration of being different; yet it is hard to maintain the impact of this message when the whole ensemble are complete weirdos anyway. A delightful bunch, nonetheless. Jordan Kai Burnett’s Scissorhands is slightly pushed into the shadows as a result, eclipsed by the eccentrics that surround them. Emma Williams, as Avon Lady Peg who adopts the waif-like Scissorhands, also adopts the role of protagonist with her wonderfully kooky, mad-as-a-hatter portrayal of the American housewife. Neighbours Joyce (Tricia Adele-Turner), Esmerelda (Annabelle Terry) and Helen (Ryan O’Connor) are as maverick and flamboyant as Abby Clarke’s primary-coloured costume design; while Dionne Gipson’s striking, ethereal ‘Inventor’ holds court from on high.

We are never completely emotionally engaged, but are always sucked into the sheer energy and sense of fun with which the performers are swamping the stage. And even if the song list gratuitously breaks the continuity of the story, the numbers are delivered with a powerful virtuosity. Like many juke-box musicals, the choice is hit and miss – some forming a neat and natural segue from the dialogue, whereas others are as isolated from the plot as Scissorhands is from reality. But, boy, there are some belters in there! Annabelle Terry’s ‘Heaven is a Place on Earth’ is a standout moment, along with Tricia Adele-Turner’s ‘Bleeding Love’ and Dionne Gipson’s ‘Mad World’. Emma Williams majestically reinvents ‘Creep’ (even though we really feel the song belongs to Scissorhands), and throughout the show, the wall of sound created by musical director Arlene McNaught’s five-piece band threaten to bring the roof down.

It is quite the spectacle, but the nuances of Burton’s original are lost in the mix, just as the quirkiness is occasionally obscured by an earnestness that is shoe-horned in. Rather than reinvented, the musical is relabelled – somewhat superficially like a ‘new-and-improved’, ‘special-offer’ packaging. Overtly establishing in a throwaway line of dialogue the correct pronoun for the lead character merely scratches the surface of the essential issue, while we either want it to dig deeper, or else take it as a given (as it should be).

There is a fair amount of disarray, but we cannot mistake the sheer joyfulness of it. The cast are superb across the board and there is an easy camaraderie that adds to the feelgood factor. The audience feel part of it all, especially when the fourth wall breaks down and boundaries are overstepped. Improvised ad-libs are let loose, often as sharp as the blades of Scissorhands’ make-shift fingers.

“Scissorhandz” is a fun-loving, camp, boisterous show bursting to crash through the walls of its chosen venue. But like Scissorhands themself, is a bit of a chimera – not quite fully formed. Yet there is something special in there, and it is an extraordinary piece of musical theatre. Its message implores us to seek that ‘special something’ within ourselves. Applied to itself, this show could well be onto a winning path to completion.

SCISSORHANDZ

Southwark Playhouse Elephant

Reviewed on 30th January 2025

by Jonathan Evans

Photography by Danny Kaan

Previously reviewed at Southwark Playhouse venues:

CANNED GOODS | ★★★ | January 2025

THE MASSIVE TRAGEDY OF MADAME BOVARY | ★★★ | December 2024

THE HAPPIEST MAN ON EARTH | ★★★★★ | November 2024

[TITLE OF SHOW] | ★★★ | November 2024

THE UNGODLY | ★★★ | October 2024

FOREVERLAND | ★★★★ | October 2024

JULIUS CAESAR | ★★★ | September 2024

DORIAN: THE MUSICAL | ★★½ | July 2024

THE BLEEDING TREE | ★★★★ | June 2024

FUN AT THE BEACH ROMP-BOMP-A-LOMP!! | ★★★ | May 2024

MAY 35th | ★★★½ | May 2024

SAPPHO | ★★ | May 2024

SCISSORHANDZ

★★★★

“the overall effect is to seduce us with a series of visuals that pack surprising punch, for all their whimsy”

The Belgian companies Focus and Chaliwaté have brought a co-production to the Peacock Theatre as part of 2025 Mime London. Their show Dimanche is a charming and whimsical piece of visual theatre, featuring puppets, humans, and sets that are both miniaturized and full size. The locations are as varied as an arctic landscape, a desert island complete with tsunami, and the house of an ordinary couple (with grandma) trying to adapt to climate change. This is a show for all ages. Children in particular will appreciate the cute animals which range from polar bears, sharks and flamingoes.

Dimanche arrives in London under the umbrella of Mime London, which specializes in finding companies whose work is hard to categorize. Curators Helen Lannaghan and Joseph Seelig have teamed up to take the place of the London International Mime Festival, which closed in 2023. Mime London is smaller scale than the LIMF, but still adept at bringing intriguing work to brighten a dark and post holiday January. With well equipped theatres such as the Barbican and Peacock hosting the festival, it’s a chance for West End audiences to see work that is usually performed abroad.

The work of Compagnie Focus and Chaliwaté in particular resists easy definition. Dimanche features three performers who take on a variety of roles in a series of wide ranging locations. They work as actors, as puppeteers, and even turn into the locations themselves from time to time. The show opens in the arctic. We watch an intrepid film crew document the effects of climate change. Our parka clad team attempt everything from driving in a blizzard to crossing unstable ice. Sometimes the scenes are miniaturized, in which case the body of one performer becomes the snowy landscape. Tiny cars drive over the curves and precipitous bends, headlights blazing through the darkness. When the ice gives way, and the audience finds itself plunged underwater, a video projected onto a screen takes over the action. For most companies, this would be sufficient challenge. But this team is just getting warmed up. From arctic exteriors the audience is transported to a domestic interior where rising temperatures outside make even the most mundane of household tasks fraught with risk. From malfunctioning electrics to melting furniture, we see Grandma and her family attempt everyday activities as though the heat were completely normal. Only when the wind and the rain literally carry the family away do we realize that the joke’s on us. This is what climate change looks like.

Compagnie Focus and Chaliwaté manage to pack in an impressive number of climate change vignettes in just over an hour. They present their theme with humour and a lightness of touch that belies the seriousness of the subject. If there’s one criticism, it is that there’s no overarching narrative, which makes it challenging to tune immediately into each scene change. At other times, the scenery (and the show) seems a bit lost on the large stage of the Peacock Theatre. But the overall effect is to seduce us with a series of visuals that pack surprising punch, for all their whimsy. The ice is melting, polar bears are being stranded on icebergs, and further south, people are struggling with hotter weather, more violent storms, and seas that threaten everything on land. Dimanche makes its point while beguiling us with cute baby polar bears stranded on icebergs, and flapping flamingos caught in destructive winds.

Dimanche is a delightful show that teaches with its entertainment. Kudos to Mime London for making Compagnie Focus and Chaliwaté part of the 2025 line up. See this show if you can. It won’t be in London long!

SCISSORHANDZ

Southwark Playhouse Elephant

★★★

“The cast are superb across the board and there is an easy camaraderie that adds to the feelgood factor”

SCISSORHANDZ

Southwark Playhouse Elephant

Reviewed on 30th January 2025

by Jonathan Evans

Photography by Danny Kaan

Previously reviewed at Southwark Playhouse venues:

SCISSORHANDZ

SCISSORHANDZ

SCISSORHANDZ

DIMANCHE

Peacock Theatre

★★★★

“the overall effect is to seduce us with a series of visuals that pack surprising punch, for all their whimsy”

DIMANCHE

Peacock Theatre

Reviewed on 30th January 2025

by Dominica Plummer

Photography by Mihaela Bodlovic

Previously reviewed at Sadler’s Wells venues:

DIMANCHE

DIMANCHE

DIMANCHE