About the play:

A boat beneath a summer's sky, lingering onward dreamily, down a quiet river in July....

Alice stumbles down a rabbit hole into a bizarre world where animals answer back, mice swim in tears, a mock turtle and a gryphon dance the lobster quadrille, time stands still at a tea party, and a Queen is worryingly eager to behead everyone. Six months later Alice embarks on yet another strange adventure when she climbs through the mirror and finds herself in a backwards world that works like a chess game. To become a Queen herself, Alice must traverse the world's most stressful train journey, endure the annoying Tweedle-Dum and Dee, and befriend a kind White Knight...

Comissioned in 2001 for the RSC (Royal Shakespeare Company) and written for his seven grandchildren, Adrian Mitchell's adaptation of Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass by Lewis Carroll, uniquely adapts both novels, and is the most complete adaptation currently for theatres in English! Although it had a somewhat difficult start, the play has bloomed into a reliable, bankable show for English-language theatres, theatre festivals, or tours, that will pull in any audience. See the reviews on our homepage for yourself!

Key professional revivals: Chichester Festival Theatre, Stamford Shakespeare Company and Jersey Arts Centre.

Why you should Produce it:

"Come, tell me how you live, and what it is you do!"

Comissioned by the prestigious RSC (Royal Shakespeare Company) UK in 2001.
A Play truly for All : suitable for age 7 + to 100!
Flexible set/props, can be made accessible : Can be easily paired down to simple settings and props for more intimate theatres or fringe/touring. Can be configured for accessible performances, including BSL, sensory adapted, captioned.
Can be performed by smaller groups : Large opportunities for doubling of characters, some actors can play up to 6 roles, varying in importance and time onstage. Everyone gets an important character.
Enormously faithful to Carroll's beloved novels : 2 plays for the price of one: both novels are adapted, using the exact structure of the books!
Fully embraces the eccentricity of its protaganist: The fictional Alice portrayed in this version is a curious, questioning, and brave adventurer in Wonderland and Looking-Glass World, and a eccentric outsider in the real world.
Creativity for design : Offers room for bold stage design and costuming.
Educational value : suitable for performances by universities, schools, and English language learners from CEFR B2 upwards.
Historical value : Offers actors a fantastic way to immerse in Victorian era history.
Culturally important: Especially for Oxford, Daresbury, Eastbourne, and other places in the UK and the world associated with Charles Dodgson, Lorina Liddell, Alice Liddell, Edith Liddell, Robinson Duckworth, and the pre-Raphelite artists (who Dodgson was friends with).
Historically important for Oxfordshire: Features the city of Oxford, where Dodgson, Duckworth, and the Liddells lived. This element is seen in the prologue/epilogue of the play. Would work as a wonderful feature in the city in July's yearly Alice celebrations.
Potential for National, medium, or small scale premieres worldwide : has not yet been produced outside of the UK and US.

The story...

"We're all ready for our story, Mr Dodgson..."

PROLOGUE

On a summer's day in 1862 Oxford, during a boating outing on the river, writer Charles Dodgson (Lewis Carroll) begins telling his friends Robinson Duckworth, and the three Liddell sisters, an amazing tale....

ACT 1

The fictional Alice, eccentric and intelligent (and 7 and a half exactly) spirals from a dull picnic on a riverbank, falling down a rabbit hole into Wonderland, where animals answer back, croquet is played with mallets and flamingos, cakes and drinks can make you big or small, a caterpillar gives advice, races are run with no end, time stands still at a bizarre tea party. A Duchess and her cook hurl plates, a mock turtle dances, a cheshire cat grins and disappears, and the ruler of Wonderland itself, the Queen of Hearts, wants to behead everyone... Just as the chaos reaches fever pitch at a chaotic trial for stolen tarts, Alice wakes curled in an armchair, in her drawing room, carried back from the riverbank by her in-story sisters... As snow begins to come down outside, Alice tells her sisters her dream.

ACT 2

Six months later in-story, the fictional Alice, after an argument with her in-story sisters, climbs through the mirror into another equally strange adventure. After reading a epic, nonsensical poem in a backwards house, Alice emerges into Looking-Glass World, where she becomes a pawn in a chaotic game of chess. On every square is a bizarre new character and situation. If Alice gets to the 8th Square, she can become a Queen. Alice soon finds herself surrounded by eccentrics like the sharp teacher like Red Queen, arrogant egg Humpty Dumpty, the White Queen (who remembers things before they happen!) The annoying Dum and Dee (who claim Alice is only the dream of the sleeping Red King) the Lion and the Unicorn (who fight for the crown) and the kind White Knight... As Alice becomes Queen, nothing goes as she expects, and as the Jabberwock she previously read about suddenly decends on her corronation banquet, she wakes with a start and finds herself in her drawing-room again... But wait, was it her dream or the Red King's?

EPILOGUE

It is evening in Oxford. As Charles Dodgson finishes his stories and the boating party head for home, 10 year old Alice Liddell implores him to "write down Alice's adventures". Although he hesitates, he promises he will try. The crew row home.