Theatre reviews: The Secret Garden | Jack And The Bean Pie

The Secret Garden is a near-perfect summer theatre experience for children, writes Joyce McMillan

The Secret Garden, Pitlochry Festival Theatre ****

Jack And The Bean Pie, Oran Mor, Glasgow ****

More than a century after its publication in 1911, Frances Hodgson Burnett’s much-loved classic The Secret Garden is fast emerging as a key children’s story for our time. At its heart, after all, Hodgson Burnett’s story is a profound legend about how human beings need the natural world and its energy to survive and thrive; and it’s difficult to imagine a more perfect setting for it than the little outdoor Amphitheatre at Pitlochry, set on the wooded hillside behind the theatre.

Matthew Churcher as Robin and Blythe Jandoo as Mary enter The Secret Garden (Picture: Neil Fordyce)

For that special space, Pitlochry’s artistic director Elizabeth Newman has made her own new stage adaptation, one that glows from its opening moments with love for, and understanding of, the basic dynamics of Hodgson Burnett’s bold narrative. At the centre stands our heroine Mary Lennox, beautifully played by Blythe Jandoo, a bad-tempered and unprepossessing 12-year-old orphaned by a cholera epidemic in the Indian imperial outpost where she was born, and sent back to live in the Yorkshire country house of her reclusive uncle.

It’s a measure of the power of Hodgson Burnett’s writing – and Newman’s perfect grasp of it – that although this situation is completely alien to the experience of most 21st century children, the story and the play make Mary’s plight instantly understandable to them, as Mary makes friends with nice housemaid Martha, and chafes against the restrictions imposed by bossy housekeeper Mrs Medlock. In no time, Mary is out in the gardens, befriending Martha’s brother Dickon and the birds and animals he loves, and finding the key both to the secret locked rose garden, and to the mystery of the loud weeping she hears in the house at night.

From there on, Ben Occhipinti’s perfectly pitched production leads us through a series of magical moments, as the stage opens up to Pitlochry’s own forest garden, and Dickon brings his animal friends to meet the audience, in gorgeous puppet form. At 95 minutes including a long interval, this beautiful show – with lovely, unobtrusive music also by Ben Occhipinti, and fine performances from a seven-strong Pitlochry ensemble – is a near-perfect summer theatre experience for children of primary school age; and the profound truth of the healing message it delivers can be felt all around us, as we sit among the glorious woodlands of Highland Perthshire, and hear them breathe in harmony with the story.

There are, by contrast, no messages at all in this year’s Oran Mor summer panto Jack And The Bean Pie, except that we should all have a good cheeky laugh to take our minds off things. When I first saw the title, I assumed – given the mighty Oran Mor satirical panto tradition – that we might at least be in for a little jokery about the recent Coronation, and the bean quiche chosen by King Charles and Camilla as their special royal dish.

Oliver Cookson plays Ben in The Secret Garden (Picture: Neil Fordyce)

In writer-composer Andy McGregor’s rollicking script, though, the idea of a pie-making competition featuring young Jack McCack’s perfect bean pie seems to have emerged from nowhere, with plenty of toilet jokes and sexual innuendo, but no satirical intent, beyond Dame Jill’s complaints about the size of her electricity bill.

Within those limits, McGregor and his company turn in a thoroughly jolly and well-made show, full of classic panto tropes and lively songs, and featuring a hilarious turn from the multi-talented Rebekah Lumsden as one Farty Pellow, a lascivious old 80s rock star drafted in as celebrity pie judge. Add an irrepressible Fraser Boyle as Dame Jill, with Richard Conlon in fine form as evil farmer Frank, and there’s plenty of scope for summer panto fun, rounded off by a song-sheet; but just a little emptiness at the heart, maybe, to make it slightly less satisfying than it should be.

The Secret Garden in repertoire at Pitlochry Festival Theatre until 19 August. Jack And The Bean Pie at Oran Mor, Glasgow, until 22 July.