11:34am Monday 19th July 2010
By Steve Pratt
SOMEONE asks where the brass band playing on the Visit Yorkshire stand comes from. “Richmond,” he’s told.
“Richmond, Yorkshire?” he suggests. “Richmond, Surrey,” comes the reply.
There’s no North-South divide at London’s Waterloo Station where the old Eurostar terminal has been transformed into the Visit Yorkshire theatre and where an old steam train chuffs and puffs nightly.
The Railway Children have upped sticks and moved to London. The show staged by York Theatre Royal that was a huge hit two years running at the National Rail Museum has gone on the road. Or should I say, tracks. And director Damian Cruden’s superb production is just as good in the new location.
There have been cast changes but thankfully Sarah Quintrell remains as Roberta, eldest of the three railway children who have lots of dramatic experiences after their father has to go away and reduced circumstances force their mother to take them to live in the country.
Jenny Agutter is the name most associated with Bobbie, but Quintrell makes the role her own and gives the show its heart. Who won’t shed a tear at the end as Father materialises out of the smoke of the steam engine on the station platform as Bobbie runs towards him with a heartfelt cry of “Daddy, daddy”.
The first appearance of the Stirling Single steam locomotive earns a deserved round of applause and the London transfer sees the debut of the Darlington-built The Old Gentleman’s Carriage in the show.
But this is a production that can stand any intrusion by a big old steam engine and still wring immense emotion from the story. That’s due to Mike Kenny’s skilful adaptation which sacrifices none of the politics or social conscience of E Nesbit’s much-loved book without losing the essence of this wonderful story of childhood.
The size of the auditorium has doubled Critics By Steve Pratt email: steve.pratt@nne.co.uk to 1,000 in the move from York to London but the setting remains the same with the audience sitting on station platforms on either side of the track, along which run trucks bearing sets, actors and, of course, the steam train.
Only Quintrell – who apparently suggested the Eurostar terminal as a London location for the show – and Marshall Lancaster’s perky station master Mr Perks remain from the original production, but the piece has been well recast with Louisa Clein’s Phyllis and Nicholas Bishop’s Peter proving good companions in the railway adventures.
Design, lighting, sound and Christopher Madin’s score all combine to make it a pretty much perfect family theatre outing.
And you can even take away a Railway Children mug, T-shirt or other limitless marketing mementos to remind you of a train journey that runs smoothly.
The production, backed by Visit Yorkshire and The Touring Consortium, attracted a suitably starry press night audience including Sally Thomsett and Bernard Cribbins from the film, Honor Blackman and Stephen Tompkinson.
The show is booking until September 5, but an extended run is a possibility. Even then it won't be the end of this particular version of The Railway Children as there are plans to stage it in another city next summer.
■ Tickets 0871-297-0740 and online rail waychildrenwaterloo.com STIRLING Single, which featured in the 2008 and 2009 productions in York, is the only Great Northern Railway G Class locomotive to have been preserved. Built in 1870 in Doncaster Works, the locomotive was designed by Patrick Stirling, Great Northern Railway’s chief mechanical engineer. After the London run, she’ll be displayed at the National Railway Museum, York.
The Old Gentleman’s Saloon – being used in the production for the first time – was used in the 1970 film. It was built in 1871 at Darlington as a four-wheeled smoking saloon for the Stockton and Darlington Railway. In the early 1880s, it was put onto six wheels and converted to become the inspection saloon for the locomotive superintendent of the North Eastern Railway, based at Gateshead.
Lengthened in 1904 and placed on a new eight-wheeled bogie frame, it was used as an inspection saloon based in Darlington and York.
In 1969, it was bought privately and taken to the newly-opened Keighley and Worth Valley Railway at Oxenhope. in West Yorkshire. Never before in its 139- year history has the saloon been so far South or visited any of the main London railway terminals.
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