Crescent Theatre Blog

With Winnie-the-Pooh having come to the end of its run, the promotional banner which had previously been on display at Cadbury World is now up for grabs.

If you would like it, leave a comment upon this article, and we’ll try and work something out for you.

The hard working cast of Winnie-the-Pooh didn’t stop yesterday (Sunday, 11 January) as they performed at two matinees AND made themselves available to entertain 30 enthralled children at the first of two special tea parties.

Children (and parents) enjoyed eating with the cast at lunch time, then sat spellbound as Pooh read a story before playing a fun game of pass-the-parcel. A great time was had by all.

A special, personal, thank you from me to everyone who helped out including cast members and others at the theatre; these special additional events make The Crescent Theatre a unique institution in Birmingham and such a great place to be. We’re doing it all over again on Saturday but, if you’re thinking of coming along, unfortunately all the tickets are sold out!

Winnie-the-Pooh, this year’s childrens’ extravaganza, is now well underway, and you can see some new photos here.

And Winnie is firmly in the spotlight today because, as the BBC reports, the-Pooh is set to return to bookshelves in a new adventure - more than 80 years after his literary debut in 1926.

In that time, Winnie-the-Pooh has become a firm family favourite, his appeal crossing the generations. Here are some things you may not know about him…

:: A A Milne named the character Winnie-the-Pooh after a teddy bear owned by his son, Christopher Robin.

:: In turn, Christopher named his teddy after a Canadian bear called Winnipeg which lived at London Zoo

:: The game Poohsticks, in which competitors drop sticks into a river upstream of a bridge and see which comes out downstream first, is first mentioned in “The House at Pooh Corner”.

:: The annual World Poohsticks Championships have been held at Day’s Lock on the River Thames since 1984.

:: Disney made its first cartoon based on the characters in 1966.

:: Milne’s first book, Winnie-the-Pooh, has been translated into dozens of languages including Latin and Esperanto.

:: There is a street in Warsaw, Poland, named after Winnie-the-Pooh.

…and finally…

:: The late Labour MP Gwyneth Dunwoody once lead a campaign to try and repatriate Christopher Robin’s original toys from the New York Public Library where they are currently kept…

[Via PA, courtesy of BBC]

A couple of days ago, DannyV posed the question about our forthcoming show Winnie-the-Pooh, “Is it full costume, as in like, a bear costume for pooh etc., no costume, or semi costume?” And it seems to be the case that the answer right now is… we don’t know yet!

More specifically, the issue of costumes for Pooh is proving to be as much of a creative process as the rehearsals and other aspects of the production. So, all manner of experiments are taking place trying to find that best combination of matching the characters and their personalities, and also contributing to the show’s overall mise en scène.

And as these recent pictures show (note how different Pooh looks in each, for example), it’s not just the costumes that need to be considered, but also the make-up that’s currently being experimented with as well…

So, to answer the original question more properly, things are still ongoing regarding costumes and make-up, with all to be revealed in January. For now though, rest assured that if these aspects match the high level of confidence currently surrounding the production, then how the characters look will be one more brilliant aspect of what is sure to be a great show!

It’s not just the singers of the Wassail who are busily making music - Pooh and his chums are getting in on the act too! Courtesy of the absurdly-talented Brendan Stanley, our forthcoming children’s Christmas show will play host to a whole suite of tunes which he has composed especially for the production.

You can hear the delightful song Little Cloud here…

To listen to some other tunes from the show, you can visit the album’s profile page on iLike.

Following last week’s Sunday afternoon in the cold at the Reindeer Parade, the cast of Winnie-the-Pooh took to the streets of the Birmingham once more as Tigger and mount Whinney-the-Pooh took part in this year’s Thomas Vale Pantomime Horse Grand National.

There was plenty of fun to be had ahead of the main race, and the team - sadly not in costume this time! - were again met with enthusiasm as they eagerly handed out flyers for the show.

Priced by Ladbroke’s at 10-1, our nag didn’t seem to be rated particularly highly amongst the field of 30-odd Colt runners, but Tigger’s alter-ego Pete Smith looked supremely confident as he lined up amongst the entrants from other local groups, all out to support a number of the Lord Mayor’s charities.

And they’re off!

Tigger stormed into an immediate lead, masterfully bouncing over the many hay bales that lay around the 500m course in Centerary Square - and managed to hold on until right near the end. With the cheers of his fellow cast members helping him along the way, it wasn’t until the very last turn that our Tigger was overtaken by the race’s eventual winner (cruelly denying me the “Winner-the-Pooh” headline I’d intended to use here).

A great second place made us justly proud, and ensured Pete took a thoroughly well-deserved place on the winners’ rostrum. Despite inevitable exhaustion, he again put himself out for the Pooh cause, and made sure that along with a wonderful trophy, one of Ian’s magnificently-made placards accompanied him in all the official (and unofficial) photographs…

Well done to everyone - and especially to Tigger and Whinney!

A few weeks have now passed and we have had several run throughs of the whole play which gives a much greater ‘feel’ for how it all hangs together. It is now all about the hard slog of learning lines and getting ‘off book’.

The recent Reindeer Parade seemed to go quite well with lots of people turning out in miserable weather. Dressed up and made up we all quickly got into character and I was pleasantly suprised that the audience recognised us immediately, despite my own ‘temporary’ costume suggesting more chav bear than Pooh bear. The large number of younger children seemed particularly over-awed by our characters and the general vibe from adults was very positive (a number of whom wanted photos with the cast).

Christmas fast approaches and we all know that the deadline for knowing our parts will soon be with us. Then the fun of the final run in can begin and we can all look forward to the terror of opening night.

Today, the cast and director behind Winne-the-Pooh took to the streets and lined up, er, behind Winnie-the-Pooh as part of Birmingham’s Christmas Reindeer and Lantern Parade. It takes more than a severe weather warning for Crescent members to miss out on the chance to dress up and play around in public…

We joined children from local schools, Scouts, two pipe bands (two too many to these ears), Santa and his elves, some snowmen and life-size Christmas crackers - to stroll through the city centre and bring a little cheer to a dismal Sunday afternoon.

(Oh, we were also backed up by people from a small theatre nearby called The Rep - who were out to promote their re-enactment of the Crescent’s 2004 Christmas show)…

With the cast members being so brilliantly made-up and costumed, it was a real pleasure to see so many children excitedly clamour to meet Piglet, Eeyore and the-Pooh himself. Despite the cold and wet, the team were bright and bouncy, bounding around with handfuls of leaflets and posing for photos with the many families who were excited to see Winnie and his friends.

With a Pooh banner held proudly aloft, we wended our way from the Bullring through New Street, Centenary Square and Broad Street, with cast members continuing to mix and mingle - not leaving anyone’s gaze without also leaving a (magnificently-designed) leaflet in every potential punter’s mitts. I am sure the eagerly-taken flyers will result in many smiling faces come January.

In a stroke of luck (or genius), the parade ended up in Brindleyplace, which meant that ‘Team Pooh’ were not far from the respite of the theatre, its members’ room and all-important kettle! A couple of broken umbrellas, a once-full suitcase of flyers completely emptied and lots of wet faces were brought back - as well as a continuing sense of fun and of a job being well done.

The cast acquited themselves with joy and purpose and promoted the show brilliantly - despite the rain, dear. And as for the reindeer, I never got to see any. However, there’s now a very shiny red nose in my mirror… Atchoo!

My first ever story book was a copy of the collected adventures of this little bear and his friends; with some of the illustrations being in colour it seemed to me quite magical. The chance to be part of a stage production was too good to miss. Imagine my delight to be cast in the title role.

The rehearsals have been going for a while now and we have had several goes at working through the whole play, so the next big thing is getting ‘off book’. I have always struggled with lines, finding rote learning rather tedious. I have used a memory route method to learn other scripts, particularly useful is involved in a dialogue with short speeches.

However, the role of Pooh has parts with several characters talking together, large gaps between lines and a number of large speeches. Dialogue tends to be easiest to learn because often what is said is a response, so the previous lines act as good cues. But remembering ad hoc interjections, or the course of a long speech, which in the case of Pooh often make quite big conceptual leaps, is proving rather tricky. I’m aways interested to find out how other actors learn their lines and whilst I have some memory techniques, I’m also interested in learning new ones.

Well, I have to go and learn a few more pages, but if anyone has any advice or suggestions I’d be really interested to hear.