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I’ve got no desire to cock a snook – or a leg – at those who want to entertain families and make a few bob during the school holidays. But this puppet-led musical adaptation of Dodie Smith’s much-loved story has become seriously mangy since it premiered at Regent’s Park in 2022. Back then I was howling my approval: last night I was whining to be let out.
It’s broadly the same show, with music and lyrics by Douglas Hodge and a book by Johnny McKnight, based on an earlier stage adaptation by Zinnie Harris: but the tone has changed. Where there was wry visual invention and sly humour there is now twee mawkishness. As one of the dogs puts it later, we’re in a place “where people talk to us in stupid, high-pitched baby voices”.
