Alice will find herself in the East End of London when she pops out of her rabbit hole this summer, as Lewis Carroll’s famous story receives a modern makeover for Alice in Canning Town. Time to book those tickets – you don’t want to be late!
The new adaptation of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland runs in a site-specific production at the Arc in the Park Adventure Playground from 12 to 18 August 2019.
When Alice follows a rabbit one day, she finds herself in an unusual, magical world filled with extraordinary characters. But this Wonderland has been reconfigured for today’s East End. All the favourite characters are still there, but in new, modern guises. A cockney rabbit, a rave-mad Mad Hatter, a hookah-smoking ex-Bollywood actor, Tweedledee and Tweedledum as hipsters, and a would-be grime artist called MC Turtle.
From Cockney to Bangra, from the Krays to Stormzy, Alice in Canning Town is a celebration of not only one of the best loved fantasies of all time, but a kaleidoscopic and action-packed journey through an East End that survived Hitler’s blitz and reinvented itself as a leading light in multicultural Britain.
Arc in the Park
The production is staged at Arc in the Park, an inclusive adventure playground in Canning Town. The tree houses, swings, trampolines, rope bridges, giant slides and teepees become the perfect setting for the playful and surreal world of Alice. It is recommended for theatregoers aged 12+, though younger audience members will be permitted with parental guidance.
Written by James Kenworth and directed by James Martin Charlton, Alice in Canning Town will feature children from local Newham primary and secondary schools performing alongside professional actors. Kenworth and Charlton previously worked together on a site specific adaptation of Animal Farm, renamed Revolution Farm, that was staged a Newham City Farm in 2014, and on A Splotch of Red: Keir Hardie in West Ham, which toured East London in 2016.
Kenworth’s other plays include Johnny Song, Gob, Polar Bear, Everybody’s World and Dementia’s Body, while Charlton, who is also a playwright, recently had drama set in the world of Renaissance art, Reformation, staged at the White Bear Theatre.
