Horrible Histories is coming to Lighthouse Poole with Terrible Tudors and Awful Egyptians, two fun-packed shows for families, from Thursday 5 to Sunday 8 November.
In Terrible Tudors we take a trip from the horrible Henries to the end of evil Elizabeth, hearing the legends (and the lies!) about the torturing Tudors. Find out the fate of Henry’s headless wives and his punch up with the Pope. Meet Bloody Mary and see Ed fall dead in his bed. Survive the Spanish Armada as it sails into the audience!
From the fascinating Pharaohs to the power of the pyramids, Awful Egyptians reveals the foul facts of death and decay with the meanest mummies in Egypt. Are you ready to rumble with Ramesses the Great? Dare you enter through the Gates of the Afterlife? It’s the history of Egypt with the nasty bits left in!
Birmingham Stage Company is one of the world’s top theatre companies for families and has produced all the Horrible Histories live stage shows since 2005. Here, director Neal Foster takes us behind the scenes…
Why and how did you form Birmingham Stage Company?
I started my theatre company when I was 19, but I wanted to do a variety of work and I realised that as an independent company you have to have a specific identity. Cheek by Jowl does Shakespeare adaptations, Shared Experience does adaptations etc, but I wanted to do Chekhov and children’s theatre and new plays and the only way you can produce such a variety of work is to have a venue. So for six months I looked up and down the country for a theatre in which to house my company and it was only by chance that I found The Old Rep Theatre in Birmingham, my home town.
It took 12 months to get the council to let me base my company at the theatre before we started in 1992. Our first Christmas show was Fantastic Mr Fox by Roald Dahl and that was what started our long association with this great writer. Fantastic Mr Fox was the first professional Christmas show at the Old Rep for 20 years and yet 17,500 people came to see it, which proved that there was a big demand for high quality children’s theatre. This has proved true during our tours all over the UK ever since.
Why do you enjoy producing children’s theatre?
I love children and I love children’s writing. A lot of children’s writing has really interesting characters. The writing and the characters are very challenging and so too are the audiences. Whereas adults go to sleep if they are bored, children will quickly let you know if they lose interest. Keeping that interest and keeping them engaged is difficult but very rewarding because they are so giving as an audience.
They often respond in a way that you don’t anticipate and you never cease to underestimate their sophistication and what they will find interesting. You can never guess what direction they will want to go in when you tell the story. That is why children’s theatre is so exciting.
How did you come to get involved with doing Horrible Histories on stage?
One day we were all sitting in the office thinking what we should do next and my Education Director said: ‘What about Horrible Histories?’ I thought it was a great idea so I looked up Terry Deary on the internet and gave him a call. He was delighted and that’s all it took – just one phone call! The rest is horrible history!
Now BSC has passed its 33-year milestone, where would you like to see yourself on the 50th anniversary?
I’d like the next two decades to continue to give me the same opportunities to work with great writing and great people in really good theatres with fantastic actors. It is less about getting bigger and more about making sure you are still excited about what you are doing. We produced five different Christmas shows some years ago and that is probably as much as I’d ever want to do at one time. I don’t want to end up running a bigger operation because then I would end up being a manager and supervising a lot of people and getting them to do creative things, whereas I like to be at the heart of the creative process. There are only four of us in the office and I want to keep it that way.
Over the history of the Birmingham Stage Company are there are any shows which really stand out for you?
We have been extremely lucky because I’d say we’ve been involved with something amazing every year since we started. So if I named highlights there would probably be at least one for every show we’ve done!
But our production of David Almond’s Skellig going to New York and our adaptation of Rudyard Kipling’s The Jungle Book were very important for us. It has been very special working with Sir Michael Morpurgo on Kensuke’s Kingdom and Why the Whales Came and a huge thrill to work with David Walliams staging his books Gangsta Granny, Awful Auntie, Billionaire Boy and Demon Dentist. Horrible Histories has given us the longest running children’s show in West End history with Barmy Britain and it was a thrill to perform at the Royal Albert Hall in ‘Orrible Opera for the BBC Proms in 2023.
You are increasingly taking BSC shows abroad – is that an area you would like to see develop?
Our international work is growing because we are being invited to travel to different countries across the world. More and more people are contacting us and asking for our shows. The list so far includes New York, India. Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Bahrain, Syria, Malta, Hong Kong, Singapore, New Zealand and Australia. Hopefully more to come!
Interview by Diane Parkes