Behind The Scenes : Cinderella, by Eleanor While, Assistant Director

We had a fantastic day of rehearsals today with lots of laughter and singing and puppets... made out of rubbish! You see this is a production of Cinderella with a twist, instead of a wave of a magic wand sending Cinderella to the ball, she is befriended by a group of vermin- Tails, Ears, Claws, Teeth and Whiskers, the gang of rats that live in her kitchen. As well as five of the actors in the show playing these rats we are also using puppets. These puppets are made out of stuff that you might find in a kitchen, a spatula, an egg-box, a colander to name a few and it is magical to see how they come together and are brought to life when they are manipulated by the actors. You see, this is a theme that runs throughout the play, that with a bit of imagination you can make an awful lot out of nothing! One of the songs that the rats sing explain this to Cinderella...

We’re having to make something out of nothing
‘Cos nothing is the only thing we’ve got.
You can’t do much with a little bit of something,
But when it comes to nothing we’ve got an awful lot of zero and nowt,
But we can still dress up pretend to go out!.......

And to hear the rest of the song you’ll have to come and watch the show and maybe you could sing along.