Alice in Wonderland

admin — Thu, 04 Jun 2015 18:41:00 +0000

This year Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland celebrates its 150th birthday. The story, about a bright and curious girl navigating her way through a shifting and changing world is fantastical and a fairy tale, deranged felines and unpunctual rabbits not being something we encounter in our every day lives. But there is depth to the story, and Lewis Carroll’s prose can be acutely relevant for humanity and daily life.
Alice, like so many young people, is struggling to come to terms with the world around her. The world is never explained and never fits a set of rules, and remains a bit nonsensical and random, because it is. She’d like it if things changed.
‘If I had a world of my own… nothing would be what it is because everything would be what it isn’t. And contrary-wise; what it is it wouldn’t be, and what it wouldn’t be, it would.’
She doesn’t know what she wants – just that she doesn’t want the way it is. This of course makes it hard for her to move forwards, and as much as she seeks advice from outside, and directions from talking cats she’s stuck. She has no goal or understanding – but this doesn’t mean her life will stand still.
‘Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?’
‘That depends a good deal on where you want to go,’ said the Cat.
‘I don’t much care where–’ said Alice.
‘Then it doesn’t much matter which way you go,’ said the Cat.
‘–so long as I get somewhere,’ Alice added as an explanation.
‘Oh, you’re sure to do that,’ said the Cat, ‘if you only walk long enough.’
But not having a particular end in mind is not a bad thing necessarily, and fluidity is important in life. When it is combined with action.
‘Begin at the beginning, and go on till you come to the end: then stop.’
The trouble is when you don’t dare to dream. It’s the Queen who plants the seed of aiming high in her head.
‘There’s no use in trying,’ Alice said, ‘one can’t believe impossible things.’ ‘I daresay you haven’t had much practice,’ said the Queen. ‘When I was your age, I always did it for a half an hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.’’
She is also struggling to come to terms with herself. Alice in Wonderland teaches us that the self is shifting and transient, and that that none of us can ‘go back to yesterday. I was a different person then.’ No one can go back to yesterday, to the unmuddled days of childhood. Thoughts and experiences all leave their marks upon us, in subtle or dramatic ways. Forging identity is one of the hardest parts of growing up – working out what makes you sparkle and thrive.
Self reflection can help. It’s important to keep exploring the self and personality, as it will change through small actions and events, but buried underneath such ephemera is the core self and values. Whilst no one should doubt themselves, we should always be questioning.
‘Was I the same when I got up this morning? I almost think I can remember feeling a little different. But if I’m not the same, the next question is ‘Who in the world am I?’ Ah, that’s the great puzzle!’
And the great question. She might have fallen down a hole and had some troublesome experiences, but ultimately Alice grows from them. There’s a lot to be learned from Alice in Wonderland.

‘She generally gave herself very good advice, (though she very seldom followed it).’

Down the church passage…to Alice In Wonderland

admin — Mon, 05 Aug 2013 09:36:42 +0000

There are some pieces of art that are so classic and so timeless, so well known that they are engrained in the collective consciousness, an important part of anyone’s cultural history, but that also deal with such universal themes in such a fluid manner that they not only allow reinterpretation and adaptation, but fling themselves at it, open to be altered, confident in the knowledge that their essence will remain the same. Alice In Wonderland, Lewis Carroll’s dizzying and frenetic tale is one such piece of art.
St Peter’s Church in Covent Garden, also called the Actor’s Church is the location for tonight’s frenetic performance, where director Andrew Lynford and his cast of the church’s house company Iris Theatre delivered a dizzying reinterpretation. At times things were a little school production in style, and at the start it was difficult to separate the entertainment happening outside in the piazza with that inside the church gardens. However, limited means often means extra creativity and festivity, and so entertainment levels were high.
To give too much away would be to undermine what the production thrives on, it’s surprise and frivolity, and edge of unexpectedness and spontaneity. Besides, you already know the story. The whole church was made use of, with the audience encourage to follow the cast down the rabbit hole, through the maze, to the tea party and beyond. The novel, given its positioning in modern literature as a children’s one (have you ever given children anything else quite so trippy?) is a deep one, exploring identity and the growth from childhood to adult life, and lines such as ‘I am not nobody,’ ‘I can’t go back to yesterday because I was a different person then’ and ‘Everything’s got moral. If only you can find it’ were picked out and delivered so as to be poignant, resonant, and entertaining, accessible and enjoyable, but also thought provoking.
All the cast were engaging as they sang and slapped their thighs, and encouraged, or sometimes forced the audience to do the same as they were lured through the surreal sets, but it was David Baynes as the angsty Scottish Mad Marsh Hare and Soho style Queen of Hearts who really shone, and Michael Lynson’s first professional performance, as the Mouse and Doremouse suggests a bright and vibrant career. As the heroine Laura Wickham held the show together with her sparking demeanour.
The Iris Theatre Company are known for their variety and vitality, dabbling in everything from Shakespearean theatre to circus style acrobatics, and this season present Alice In Wonderland, Julius Caesar and The Hunting of the Snark. Don’t go expecting National Theatre style acting quality. Do go to smile.
[vimeo 70638238 w=500 h=281]
Alice in Wonderland Trailer from Iris Theatre on Vimeo.

Lewis Carroll – and so she thinks

Alice in Wonderland

Down the church passage…to Alice In Wonderland