‘Fast is FUN!” bellows Pinocchio as he tears about the stage, testing the limits of his newly animated legs. It’s a handy edict for anyone adapting the many moralising, terrifying and bizarre episodes within Carlo Collodi’s 1883 novel. Charlie Josephine and Jim Fortune’s new family musical takes heed, barreling out of the blocks to cover an impressive chunk of Collodi’s story while swapping its darkness and finger-wagging for heartwarming lessons and boisterous humour.
In a narrow-minded Italian town (hammily chorused “mamma mias!” kick off the blissful silliness to come), free-thinking inventor Geppetto is an outcast. His ticket to adventure arrives as a piece of talking wood, which he plans to craft into a fortune-winning puppet. Pinocchio, of course, has other ideas. But here, the puppet’s journey to boyhood isn’t just about learning what makes us good, but what makes us human. His scrapes along the way are born not out of wickedness but curiosity and impulsive energy – perfectly captured by the three puppeteers animating Peter O’Rourke’s simple wooden design (including Lee Braithwaite, who gives Pinocchio a voice wild and wonder-filled), and by Josephine’s book, which sees Pinocchio firing off life’s big questions only to interrupt the answers with yells of “I’m hungry!”
