Red Racing Hood

Any latent desire (by an adult) to return to childhood can be fulfilled by seeing a Terrapin Puppet Theatre production for children. That was my recent experience when I took myself along to see Red Racing Hood at the Theatre Royal Backspace. Terrapin’s Red Racing Hood is not so much a reworking (or reimagining) of Little Red Riding Hood, as a nod to the well known and loved children’s story.

Writer Sean Munro wrote a lovely, funny script, for people and puppets. The script was terrific, childish and a teensy bit sophisticated in turns, with word-play that tickled the grownups. The setting of the famous fairytale becomes the small town of Grinalong. When the new mayor announces the return of the local motor race, the Grinalong Classic, the whole town is excited, but the race will go through Tangled Woods, where a giant wolf is rumoured to live. With everything she knows and loves at stake, Red must convince her mechanically savvy Gran to let her compete and overcome her own fears in the process.

The appeal of Red Racing Hood covers many generations, keeping the young children in the audience as engaged as their parents, grandparents and friends. Some families, who had smallish children (3-ish to 5/6-ish), and others who came with older (8-12 year olds) all seemed to enjoy the show. The adults really loved it, revelling in the many levels of humour, delivered by energetic actors with terrific timing.

Maeve Mhairi MacGregor was a wonderful Red, and Bryony Geeves was a feisty Gran, fabulous as always. Thomas Pidd is a delight and relates beautifully with an audience. I really liked the seamless changes when the actors glided in and out of puppet-wrangler mode. Loved the wolf! For a bad-guy, this puppet was rather endearing, and not so much bad, as misunderstood.

The complex but contained set suited the studio-theatre of the Backspace, but easily adapted for touring to school performances. The only regret was that I didn’t have young person to go with on the day! A clever, lovely, funny show!

Merlene Abbott