Alice In Wonderland

Full Synopsis

Opening with the first number, So Who’d Ask For More, the Lyndhurst Villagers are all celebrating at the Village fayre. Alice appears in all the merriment searching for her pet cat, Dinah but she gets caught up when she sees a White Rabbit with a pocket watching announcing he is running late.

Intrigued Alice follows him, jumping down the rabbit hole into a land of adventure. Feeling like she has been falling forever Alice soon finds herself next to a table on which there is a cake, a bottle and a key. Eating the cake and drinking from the bottle in turn make Alice grow and shrink until in her desperation she starts to cry. All her tears result in her swimming through the door’s keyhole where she meets the Dodo and a host of eccentric characters who are all preparing for The Caucus Racing Set.  Fast and funny the Caucus Race is very high energy and all of the racers win the race and are rewarded with prizes but as they weren’t expecting Alice she is rewarded with her very own thimble!

Alice is soon distracted though as the White Rabbit appears once again declaiming he is running late and so Alice dashes off after him. When she finds the White Rabbit he completely confuses her by calling her Mary Ann and instructing her to search for his missing scarf, hat and fan. Alice, who can barely get a word in edgeways is left so surprised by the White Rabbit that she goes in search of his missing items and soon finds herself at his burrow where she meets his Housekeeper and all the animals that look after his home, including Bill the Lizard and Owl.

The Housekeeper welcomes Alice, even though she too calls her Mary Ann and welcome her in the number You’re Always Welcome Here. Eventually they do find the White Rabbit’s hat, scarf and gloves, just in time as he returns and then dashes off immediately with Alice following him once again.

Having lost site of the White Rabbit Alice meets the Caterpillar. By this time Alice is so confused about who and where and what she is she asks the Caterpillar for advice but all he does is confuse her even more.  Fortunately Alice next meets the friendly Cheshire Cat with his famous grin. The Cheshire Cat explains to Alice that everyone is mad in Wonderland that she must be mad too or she wouldn’t be there, before he points her in the direction of the Mad Hatter and March Hare’s Tea party.

At her wits end Alice sits down and joins the Tea Party despite being uninvited and joins in the riddles and game playing. The Act finished with the fabulously funny and high octane Tea Party number.

The second Act finds Alice in the Palace Gardens where she discovers a group of cards painting white roses red. When Alice asks why they explain they had planted the wrong colour and if they don’t fix the problem the Queen will cut of their heads. Alice refuses to believe the Queen could be so scary and that’s when the Queen makes her big entrance with her show-stopping number Off With The Heads.

When the Queen notices Alice she asks who she is and why she is there but before she can really answer the Queen yells, “Off with her head!” The King stops her and Alice begins to play a game of croquet. The Queen is clearly cheating and declares herself the winner. When Alice tries to argue, the queen threatens to behead her again! No matter what Alice will say or do, the Queen will threaten to behead her. The Queen asks Alice if she has seen the Mock Turtle. She replies that she does not even know what a mock turtle is. The Queen is appalled and insists that Alice go and hear his story.

The Queen passes her off to the Gryphon and tells him to take her to the Mock Turtle. As he tells his story, the White Rabbit rushes in announcing that the trial is about to begin. Everyone runs off to the courtroom. The trial, like everything in Wonderland seems like total nonsense. All of the characters Alice had met are being called as witnesses and they are all displaying their madness and idiosyncrasies. As everything builds Alice gets worked into a frenzy, the cards seem to take over her completely. She suddenly awakes back in Lyndhurst and is discovered by the Town Cryer, who bears a striking resemblance to the Cheshire Cat. Alice realises that she has only been dreaming. But what a curious dream it was!