SUNDAY, AUGUST 30, 2026
Wonderland
Production Photo: Melissa Gordon
A bridge between the nihilistic, numbing, nimble and novel in a real and unreal world, the Ravara Production of Gregory Boyd, Jack Murphy and Frank Wildhorn's Wonderland, directed by Kerry Rodgers, intrigues and excites in retelling Lewis Carroll's literary classics about a girl named Alice, a looking glass and a wonderland as captivating contemporary commentary on a still young but mature woman battling to reclaim purpose and belief in her personal universe – in prose, song and dance. It is about the public and imaginary spaces we move through and how they formulate and shape our personalities, a pathway from the machinic to the magical and more which captures the audience's attention with energised spirit.
With a brain trained into a corporate drain and a blue dress that stands out in its paleness, our Alice (played by Sophie Toal in the first two performances of the show's run, and Rachel Smith in the final two) seems trapped and distant, not just in her marriage to Jack (Jake Bennett, who does double duty as the Wonderland's White Knight) but also in her job as a video game developer in modern day New York City. Her creative impulses appear to clash with the board's, and, having a young daughter named Chloe (Lily Rafferty in the first two performances, Sarah McSparron in the last two) to support, she's like a working girl with a baby boom but no steely magnolia for a sanctuary. To put it another way, she’s burdened by sociocultural norms. Therefore, a journey down the famous rabbit hole – here a broken elevator shaft in a high rise building – after the White Rabbit (Matilda Gibson), and into the Wonderland, isn't an unfortunate diversion but a crucial escape.
One might think that the insertion of a broken family and city life into the Carrollian mix may be too heavy for this sort of tale, along with the mother and not the offspring going after the rabbit, but it works. It works wonderfully as a mirror to how one strives to maintain the routine and responsibility that inevitably consumes imagination in simultaneous careerism and parenthood, and how said imagination is in danger of falling out of their picture altogether. Imagination which, as the play states, is the only weapon against reality – and here it is smartly sprung upon us and fully utilised by the Ravara team, as the musical anarchy begins in their very own wonderland.
Production Photo: Melissa Gordon
Wildhorn's music comes across, to these ears, as a rather bonkers and intentionally overwhelming blend of circus tunes, cabaret, big band and balladry, and I'm all for that. For once you align them with vibrant choreography like Conor Anderson's, precise musical direction like Adam Darcy's and a cast that uniformly excels as individuals and as a group - especially Eva McColgan as a scene-stealing Mad Hatter - it's hard not to be swept away. And it's equally hard not to be spellbound by how well the cast are able to express the emotion and value in the lyrics, as this Wonderland becomes, quite possibly, the steely magnolia of a sanctuary that its Alice perhaps desires, with confessions and insular discoveries emerging from and alongside the colourfully costumed and indisputably iconic characters.
What one learns, and learns well, from Wonderland is that even when consistency and stability appear to have been found, they are not the end point - for Wonderland isn't about finding an ending, happy or not. It's about finding a new beginning based on and inspired by newly discovered wisdom which arises from personal experiences. It is a fresh and dynamic delve into familiar memories that we may often imagine to be most powerful from a distance, in their sacred untouchability, but can actually be much more powerful when returned to, for while the temptation to leave the past in the past is always there, the value of reflective revisitation from an ever-changing and developing perspective is truly indelible. Purpose and mindset are never set in tone or commanded – they are a constant struggle in evolution. And in this we see the wonders of Lewis Carroll's Wonderland, receiving perhaps, in my view, their sharpest and liveliest musical telling yet.
Simon Fallaha
Ravara Productions' adaptation of Wonderland concludes its run at The MAC, Belfast, on Sunday August 30. For more information, click here.