This is a re-imagining of the fairytale-cum-pantomime, Jack and the Beanstalk, in which a young lad called Jack buys some magic beans in exchange for the cow he is selling and climbs the beanstalk up into the clouds to the land of giants. Thus far, the tale is not too dissimilar, however, once there, the head giant is giving a scientific lecture in which Jack learns about the importance of plants and our ecosystem, uses the giant's book as a parachute and comes back to earth and his mum to start to grow beans and save our planet from our own wanton destruction.

With a painted backdrop of a stereotypical Cornish cliff with a disused tin mine, which is cleverly turned as Jack climbs higher, the humans in this story, and Daisy the cow, are puppets, whilst the giants are the actresses who have been manipulating and voicing the puppets. It's a clever and yet simple idea which worked well.

With a couple of jokes thrown in for the parents, and plenty to keep the youngsters' attention, this was a very good hour's show, which can be altered slightly for each performance depending on the age and ability of their audience.

In this afternoon's performance, since majority of the audience were families, then there was plenty to keep the adults happy too. The very young, of which there were quite a few, were lost within the first five minutes, but the company does advertise that the show is suitable from 5 years and so those who had children in the audience younger than five can only blame themselves!

The first half of the play was very wordy with little action, and the voices of the characters were so similar it was impossible to tell, with eyes closed, which character was speaking. The second half was much more visually stunning with a lot less dialogue. For some though, this was just a little late in coming, although you did manage to bring most of them back once the experiments started and the more familiar pantomime routines and chases were underway.

A lot of the production used some very tiny puppets (well, actually insects on the end of sticks!) which in the theatre at Sale were lost. I was sitting half-way back and was unable to see much of the small insect acting. The insect-montage underground as we see the beanstalk take root was a nice idea and excellently executed, but perhaps went on too long without explanation, and the scientific experiments from the giant were also entertaining but what was being said was way above the children's heads... carbon dioxide, photosynthesis, etc... But they did like the results of your experiments as things exploded and popped. The geyser though was ever so close to one of the lamps above the stage!

At the end of the show, the three actresses stayed behind to both sell activity packs to the parents / children, and to allow the children to get closer to the puppets and see them and touch them themselves.

Without any programme or cast list, I too, stayed behind to find out a little about the actresses and the company producing. The company is Cornish-based TIE Company Light Theatre and this tour of The Magic Beanstalk started on the 9th February in schools in Cornwall, and, after a week's stint at The Little Angel Theatre in London, returns to Cornwall for the end of the tour on the 9th July.

The three actresses and puppeteers were Mae Voogd, Rachael Leonard and Jenny Beare, and the whole piece was conceived, written, produced and directed by Charlotte Bond. The puppets were designed and created by Lyndie Wright, and incidental music by Phil Innes.

Reviewer: Mark Dee

Reviewed: 19th March 2016