St Christopher’s Infant School took over the entire theatre when they went to see ‘What the Ladbybird Heard’, based on the popular children’s book by Julia Donaldson, at the Cultural Hall in May. The show was fabulous with cheerful, catchy songs and a hilarious plot.

The children were enthralled by the amazing, colourful set, which was like walking into a page from the book, thanks to a collaboration with illustrator Lydia Monks. They clapped and cheered loudly in all the right places, shouted out animal noises when required and joined in with the songs.

The farm adventure from the book is relatively short, so the writers have created a half-hour preamble, taking the actors out of character to play stage managers, trying to resolve the problem of having no real animals. At one point, when looking for a ‘missing’ actor who had ‘accidentally’ seen his way to Abu Dhabi, the cast asked for a ‘tall and lanky’ person from the audience. Suddenly the entire audience were screaming for Mr Churchill to go up on stage who tried his best to hide under his seat.

After this set up was complete the actual story began which stayed true to Donaldson’s wonderful words.

The talented cast all played instruments on stage to bring a live element to the backing track. The final foot-tapping song was more upbeat than any others and had everyone standing up, sitting down and looking under their seats!

As we left, the beaming faces of almost 600 children gave the show all the reviews it would ever need.