Entertainment

Magic in the air as Bedknobs and Broomsticks flies on to Belfast stage

Disney's much-loved classic family movie Bedknobs and Broomsticks has been turned into an enchanting stage musical. Jenny Lee caught up with the cast during its run in Dublin and gives us a taste of what to expect when the musical comes flying into Belfast

Dianne Pikington (Miss Eglantine Price) and Charles Brunton (Emelius Browne) in Bedknobs and Broomsticks. Picture by Johan Persson.
Dianne Pikington (Miss Eglantine Price) and Charles Brunton (Emelius Browne) in Bedknobs and Broomsticks. Picture by Johan Persson. Dianne Pikington (Miss Eglantine Price) and Charles Brunton (Emelius Browne) in Bedknobs and Broomsticks. Picture by Johan Persson.

DANCING broomsticks, flying beds, luminous dancing fish and stunning puppetry are all part of the magic in Disney's newest stage adaptation, Bedknobs and Broomsticks.

Based on the 1971 Disney classic, the story centres on the three Rawlins children, who are orphaned and then evacuated from London during the Second World War.

Sent by train to the fictional Dorset town of Pepperinge Eye, they find themselves in the reluctant care of the eccentric Miss Price, who tries to serve them worms instead of sausages.

Charlie - at 13, the eldest Rawlins child - decides to take charge and organise their escape. But as the trio stare out of the window looking for a way out of their misery they spy trainee witch, Miss Price, flying on a broom.

And so, the magic begins as they are whisked off for adventures in London, under the sea and on an island of animals.

The show comes to Belfast later this month and I was fortunate enough to watch the magic come to life during its recent run in Dublin.

Whilst the rousing Sherman Brothers songs, including A Step in the Right Direction and The Beautiful Briny are there, the on-going war in Ukraine has added more meaning to this emotionally powerful journey about displacement, belonging and family.

Playing the role of apprentice witch Eglantine Price is 46-year-old West End actress Dianne Pilkington.

"It's always been quite an emotional piece and even more so now. It starts with air raid sirens, explosions and gas masks - the situation many families are living out in reality in Ukraine," says Wigan-born Pilkington, as we speak behind the scenes at Dublin's Gaiety Theatre.

"And like in the play we are now experiencing young refugees, like Charlie, Carrie and Paul coming to our country. Audiences quite often have a tear in their eye at the end of performances and even more so now."

The role of Eglantine Price in the Disney film was originally played by Angela Lansbury, of whom Pilkington is a huge fan.

"I'm obsessed with her. She's just so quirky, eccentric, fully aware and a genuine all-rounder, who is great at telling a story through song."

During the course of our conversation she discovers that Lansbury's grandfather William McIldowie was a former director of the Grand Opera House.

"Are you serious?" she says, jumping around on her seat with enthusiasm. "I can't wait to visit the theatre for the first time and now it's even more special."

She shocked her fellow cast members during rehearsals by turning up wearing an Angela Lansbury Murder She Wrote-style face mask.

"I bought the face mask in March 2020 at the start of the pandemic before I knew of this musical or that I would be doing it. The rest of the cast thought it hilarious."

Despite her admiration for Lansbury, Pilkington has made the part her own.

"I've based her on the icons of the 1940s, the fantastically strong women who lived in those difficult times," she says.

"Also we're in a different time. Although it is still set in the 1940s, I've tried to come at it from a modern point of view."

In the adventure, Price is learning sorcery through a correspondence course because she's had a vision of an enemy invasion and wants to help defeat them without human loss.

She is missing a crucial spell, 'substitutiary locomotion', which brings inanimate objects to life, and she and the children take off on the airborne bed in an effort to find it.

Her supposed magic professor Emelius Browne (Charles Brunton) is their first port of call. On and off stage enthusiasm rebounds from the Southampton actor.

Best known for his roles in musical theatre, as a child he appeared in the original cast of Oliver! in the London Palladium. His more recent credits include Miss Trunchbull in the West End production of Matilda The Musical and as Lumiere in Disney's Beauty and the Beast, which he enjoyed performing at Belfast's Grand Opera House.

"I'm looking forward to visiting Belfast again and celebrating my birthday there," says Brunton.

He has thoroughly enjoyed playing Emelius, giving comedy precedence over cadence, and has especially loved learning some magic tricks of his own.

"The musical has acknowledged the film, whilst also updating it and adding some extra songs and plot twists," he tells me.

"We can see the audiences' reaction and as the bed flies you can hear the gasps of the audience. But what I love is that there is still that old Victorian-style magic too."

Brunton admits that he hasn't always got the street magic with silks, coins and flowers correct on stage. "Thankfully I'm not a very good magician, so when mistakes happen it's OK," he chuckles.

Helping them master the art of stage magic is co-director Jamie Harrison, who created the stage illusions in Harry Potter and the Cursed Child and also worked on the West End productions of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Pinocchio.

"Charlie and I perform the linking rings trick together and the first week of rehearsals I dropped them that many time I was on the floor having a huge meltdown," says Pilkington, chuffed she's now able to amaze her nine-year-old son, Hugo.

Bedknobs and Broomsticks is one of only a handful of films, including Mary Poppins, that mixed live action with animation.

In the stage show the talking animals are brought to life with spectacular detailed puppetry.

The set revels in old fashion theatre, but with the lack of obvious suspended wires, it's the technical wizardry of illusion that most of the audience are talking about afterwards.

"It's done in a very clever way," adds Pilkington, who although on paper didn't think she was like her character, admits she shares many similarities.

"We were told they were looking for someone quirky, eccentric and not child friendly as they had to learn to exist in a family unit. But after doing it we quickly realised we were playing ourselves," she laughs.

"When I watched the film as a kid I thought David Tomlinson was very like my dad in terms of mannerisms and that has helped me make the character very believable," says Brunton.

:: Bedknobs and Broomsticks plays at Belfast's Grand Opera House from April 27 to May 1. Goh.co.uk.