The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe At The Shaw Festival
Back in 2016 at the Stratford Festival, Shaw Artistic Director Tim Carroll directed an adaptation of C. S. Lewis’ The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (hereinafter LWW) by English playwright Adrian Mitchell. I didn’t review that show but I remember it as being quite successful, especially the ingenious puppet of Aslan, the lion king of Narnia.
This year, the Shaw Festival is offering a new adaptation of LWW written by Carroll and Selma Dimitrijevic, who also directs. I found it a mixed bag.
As director, Dimitrijevic seemed a bit uncertain as to how best to present the tale. How about a musical? There is a very nice dance sequence early on and some anachronistic background singers in some later scenes, but this rendition of LWW is very much a play, albeit with a bit of music here and there.
One of the best ideas the producers had was to pack the first three rows of the Festival Theatre with the under-ten crowd. Their total fascination with the goings on onstage helped grown ups like me stay engaged. I fear that otherwise my mind might have drifted.
The adaptors have changed the storyline a fair bit. I know this not because I am a Lewis scholar (I am not) or because I have read LWW (I have not), but because Carroll and Dimitrijevic tell us so in a “conversation” printed in the programme.
These tweaks seem to have irritated some Narnia purists. I came to the material fresh, with no preconceived ideas of how the tale should spin out. I found it engaging if somewhat confusing.
In the book, the Pevensie children (Kristi Frank, Alexandra Gratton, Jeff Irving, and Dieter Lische-Parkes, all very good) are packed off to a gloomy house in the north of England in 1940 to escape the London Blitz. This was not made at all clear in this LWW and I couldn’t help wondering what the kiddies down front made of it.
In their new home the kids enter a room that they have been told is strictly off limits. (Of course they do!) There they find a large wardrobe and in the course of a game of hide and seek discover it is a portal to the land of Narnia. This magical realm exists in a permanent state of winter under the spell the evil White Witch (a striking Élodie Gillett in an equally striking costume by Judith Bowden).
Adventure ensues and the children seem to grow to adulthood as they become key figures in the battle of good versus evil. Of course – spoiler alert – good triumphs eventually, heralded by the Spirit of Narnia (Alana Bridgewater), an unnecessary character interpolated by the adaptors.
Whereas other versions of the Narnia stories I have seen at Shaw and Stratford made imaginative use of puppets, the puppetry in this LWW (by Brendan McMurtry-Howlett) is another mixed bag. Mr. and Mrs. Beaver (Shawn Wright and Jade Repeta) are quite successful, while Aslan (Kelly Wong) is merely odd.
Wong plays the part well, but instead of the majestic king of the jungle he should be, this Aslan is very much a man who, rather incongruously, sports the head of a lioness strapped to his right shoulder.
Carrol and Dimitrijevic tells us they have little interest in Lewis’ Christian apologetics and yet the moments of death and resurrection in the play’s final scenes seemed pretty New Testament to me.
So, like I say, a mixed bag.
Shaw has announced that LWW will be their last foray into the so-called Chronicles of Narnia. A wise decision, say I.
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe continues at the Festival Theatre through October 4, 2025. For more information and to purchase tickets, visit the Shaw Festival website.
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