Jules Verne’s caper is a good fit for the Dukes theatre’s annual promenade around Williamson Park. The journey undertaken by Phileas Fogg – in this case, one that starts and finishes in Lancaster – provides just the right dramatic justification for the audience to move from location to location.
It starts in a pond with the actors drinking rosé wine in a boat, takes us to an Indian railway when the path is at its straightest and shows us a cowboy encampment, complete with open fire, when we reach the natural amphitheatre of the Dell. It doesn’t take too much imagination to believe the Ashton Memorial, where the final scene plays out, could be the kind of property a wealthy Victorian would occupy.
