If you’ve read Julia Donaldson’s The Paper Dolls it’s possible that you’ve got to the end without sobbing. But I doubt it. Choosing this book for bedtime has become a bit of mischief for my five-year-old daughter, Aggie. She watches me intently as I read and when we reach the final pages, she grins: “Are you going to cry now, Daddy?”
So I’m steeling myself for our first bit of weepie theatre when we arrive at the Little Angel for a preview of their adaptation, a co-production with Polka, directed by Peter Glanville. The show gets immediate approval from Aggie by sticking to the story’s original opening, with a girl and her mum making paper dolls. There’s something satisfying about seeing the delicate string of dolls snipped out of paper right in front of us before they’re swapped for sturdier puppets. And we have lots more to marvel at: the girl’s butterfly hair clip, which can be spotted on every spread in the book, comes to fluttering life, its wings shimmering thanks to a lovely lighting design.
Rebecca Cobb’s cheery illustrations have directly influenced the puppets for the girl (who has been named Rosie) and the dolls, who are taken on an adventure through her home and into her rich imagination. Their names trip off the tongue: “Ticky and Tacky and Jackie the Backie and Jim with two noses and Jo with the bow”. I’ve always found Jackie the Backie a bit creepy – she stands among the happy-looking dolls but she’s been drawn as if seen from behind, so has a mess of hair where her smile should be. This adaptation adds a nice line about her (“she’s shy”) and an extra observation about Jim’s rather random second nose (“super smelling powers!”).
In the book, the girl’s relationship with her mum is playful and sweetly simple. This adaptation allows a gentle note of realism, giving the mother a moment or two of exasperation and exhaustion, and introducing a full-scale meltdown for Rosie that requires the full efforts of two puppeteers – one controlling the beating fists, the other controlling the stamping feet. This scene gets roars of laughter from the adults but there are soon wails of outrage from the children when Rosie’s older brother, Tommy, snips the dolls to bits. In the book this scene is quietly devastating and introduces the tearjerking finale. But in the show Aggie finds it funny (she later says it’s the best bit).
Cobb’s dolls drift from page to page, gaining a sense of momentum from a classic Donaldson rhyme (“You can’t catch us. Oh no no no! We’re holding hands and we won’t let go.”) This becomes a song in the show but the melody is delivered gently which rather robs the dolls of their exuberance. But as a symbol, they still work brilliantly well for old and young audiences in a tale about family bonds (actor-puppeteers Andrea Sadler and Jane Crawshaw are excellent as mother and daughter respectively), and the links between generations.
Aggie and I tend to round off a theatre trip with an ice-cream. When she plaintively whispers “ice-cream” I know that a show has outstayed its welcome. Sometimes that happens in the first few minutes; this time it’s right before the end, just after an ambitious sequence exploring the girl’s memory and her own journey into motherhood. It is spellbinding and completely captures the emotional force of the book’s finale. Aggie delivers her verdict (better than We’re Going on a Bear Hunt, not as good as Dogs Don’t Do Ballet) and bounds up the aisle. Meanwhile, I appear to have something in my eye…
