A popular new family musical begins its Christmas run at The Lowry: Mr Popper’s Penguins.
Based on the book by Richard and Florence Attwater, this was also given the Hollywood treatment in 2011 starring Canadian funnyman JimCarrey.
Mr Popper is a jolly man. He earns a living painting locally in the village he lives in with Mrs Popper.
He likes to spend his spare time reading about the North Pole and listening to the radio programmes broadcast from the Antarctica.
He is fascinated by penguins and dreams of one day visiting their home country.
One morning a large crate arrives and to Mr Popper’s surprise out pops a penguin!
They decide to keep him and name him Captain Cook.
The mischievous penguin causes chaos around the house but before long gets lonely and homesick so Mr and Mrs Popper acquire a friend for him which results in new adventures for the growing family.
This simple story is told well by a small multi-talented cast slipping from one character to another and also to master the puppet pengiuns with ease.
The stars of the show are most defiantly the cute and cuddly penguins who are adorable and an instant hit with the youngsters in the audience.
The staging is basic with the cast bringing props on and off from the sidelines to adapt it to a living room, street and even a ship.
It is all open with no curtains to concealing the sides of the stage so we could see all the items not in the latest scene; I felt this did make the play lose some of the magic.
The snow showering the audience was a lovely touch as was the penguin dance the whole auditorium were encouraged to join in with – and the majority did!
At just under a hour long it is a ideal length for toddlers. Mr Poppers Penguins is performed in the smaller Quays theatre which is ideal for this kind of show.
Enjoyable fun and reasonably priced.
