If you are in any doubt that this adaptation of the 1952 Mary Norton novel has lost its way long before the interval, just check out the first big song of the second half. By this stage, the stakes should be high. The tiny creatures who live under the skirting boards, surviving off human scraps – borrowed not stolen – are under assault. The boorish Mrs Driver (Claire Storey), a “human bean” with a fetish for cleanliness, is sensing their presence and has inadvertently hoovered them up.
This is life-and-death stuff and demands an impassioned response. But what do we get? Only a song about paper planes. This duet between Young Eddie (Matthew Heywood), a 10-year-old boy, and Arrietty (Amy Tara), the 13-year-old Borrower he has befriended, comes complete with instructions about where to make the folds. In a show with few songs, it is weirdly tangential and does little to expand our understanding of Arrietty’s journey from claustrophobia to freedom.
