THEATRE REVIEW: The Midnight Gang - Chickenshed Theatre, London.

I have two children, and as a family we have now, including this one, seen 5 live theatre productions of this story, as well as read David Walliams' book too. Most unfortunately, but it has to be said, this version by London's Chickenshed Theatre Company, is, to date, the worst we have encountered.

Streamed online by Chickenshed Company from their live production in 2017, it came across as lacklustre, poorly acted with no connectivity or chemistry between the cast, and despite there being a live audience in attendance and the story being a comedy, they were extremely short of laughs!

I am aware of the ethos of the company, and it is more than laudable that they would want to allow anyone from any background the opportunity to perform, but there must also be a point where this becomes impractical or even impossible if it compromises the quality of a production, especially when the company has built up such a good reputation and is a professional one too.

The set was minimalist at best and really didn't help in our understanding of time and place at all, and the adult professional actors working with the juveniles in the Midnight Gang did little or nothing to inspire and lift the atmosphere.

The story is about a young boy who is admitted to a hospital after receiving a bump on the head from a cricket ball at school. He is told that his parents are away abroad and cannot be contatced and the hospital seems to specialise in caring for would-be orphans in a very creepy Roald Dahlian fashion. However, after being given the only night attire the hospital has - a pink nightdress - he joins the Midnight Gang of children who go down to the basement each midnight to re-enact their dreams. In the process they get up to all kind of scrapes with the larger-than-life characters that people the hospital, as well as being a tale of friendship, family, love and caring. It is a shame that this story did not resonate at all, leaving my children bored, not even wanting to watch the play to the end; whilst the live audience recorded were noticably quiet, apart from one youngster who made distractingly loud wailing noises in the second half which could so easily have been edited from the playback.

This was also the only version of the live show that hasn't included any songs. There was scene-change music, which could so easily have been made into songs and dances, but sadly this didn't materialise.

Reviewer - Chris Benchley
on - 22/8/20