A -literally - explosive production has taken audiences at Newcastle Theatre Royal by storm. Viv Harwick reports on the glamour, and the danger, of The Firework-Maker's Daughter.

NOT many productions can boast as many fireworks on stage as the aptly-named The Firework-Maker's Daughter, the family show which has exploded into life on Tyneside this week.

Thanks to the imagination of writer Philip Pullman - just voted Greatest Briton For The Arts - the incredible tale of a young girl who wants to end the male taboo on creating fireworks captivated London audiences last year.

Now Stephen Russell's adaptation of Pullman's play-book-play development is on tour to Newcastle's Theatre Royal this week.

The 12-strong cast includes Mo Zainal as the elephant keeper and best friend of Lila, the play's heroine.

A recent graduate of the Royal Shakespeare Company academy, which toured King Lear at Newcastle's Playhouse, Zainal admits that the pyrotechnics provided quite a challenge at Hammersmith's Lyric Theatre.

He says: "The production did have troubles in the past and we've had to scale down some of the explosions. There are flashes and to be honest when I was first told I thought 'hang about I don't think I'm getting paid enough' but I don't want to give too much away.

"We have supreme professionals on the special effects to make sure nothing goes wrong, although it may stink of sulphur from time to time," he laughs. "Physically, it is very demanding and people were dropping like flies after the three-month run at The Lyric.

"When we've got matinees on a Wednesday and Saturday and an evening show it really hurts I can tell you. There's lots of strain on muscles and joints and I'm climbing up poles, climbing up on people's backs and the elephant and I'm jumping on and off the stage and I'm dodging a firework that might kill me. Most of the cast of 12 are never off stage so it takes its toll. It's a bit of marathon and at one time all I wanted to do was lie in a hot bath, eating grapes handed to me by Amazonian women."

In addition to dodging small explosions, Zainal also has to bring a white elephant to life on stage. He explains: "I was amazed at what we could do with the little we do have. There's huge big buckets and two big umbrellas and to see the whole thing constructed on stage is incredible particularly when my elephant is a grumpy old sod at times and likes to charge."

He's also impressed with Ayesha Antoine who has taken on the title role with great enthusiasm.

"She's fantastic and although she's had little training, but she's got such enthusiasm for what she's doing and really got her head screwed on."

Asked about the merits of appearing in a family production, which almost falls in the realms of panto, he pays tribute to Pullman's work and the involvement of the Told By An Idiot company, which is well-known in Newcastle thanks to tours and a Northern Stage Lorca commission in 1998.

He says: "I think there are actors who do have qualms about coming into productions like this. The children listen to you and give you an honest opinion and are not infected by the name of the theatre or who the director is or the politics of who is doing what in the cast. And this is a show which has the audience whooping and hollering."

All this is a long way from Zainal's original intention of becoming a child psychologist before he decided that the Army would look after his future.

He explains: "I thought it would be the easy life if I got myself in the Army. I went for a week's training course at the Strensall Barracks near York and we got beasted. We got hunted down by soldiers at paint-balling and were woken at 4am in the morning and I found myself standing outside in my boxers, so I decided it wasn't for me."

Three years of Theatre Study at Manchester Met University saw him offered acting roles with the RSC, the Donmar Warehouse and with the Young Vic.

He's now London-based but is set to open at Edinburgh's Traverse Theatre in April in a new Chinese play called In The Bag about domestic life in Beijing.

Thanks to having a Malaysian dad and a mum "who was a bit of gipsy" the actor still dreams of visiting far-off corners of the world.

Zainal says: "From the age of two until I was 12 we lived in Malaysia and Indonesia and then we came back and lived in Scotland and America.

"This character I'm playing called Chulak is pretty much a street urchin. I got an insight into his life when I was in Malaysia at the age of 12. I wasn't allowed to go to school because I had a British passport so I travelled around the country with my uncle delivering electrical goods and got a feel of the place for a year.

"So I was the cheeky little rascal with the motto: 'if you don't ask you don't get'."

* The Firework-Maker's Daughter runs until Saturday. Box Office: 0870 905 5060.

Published: 03/02/2005