Horrible Histories: The Awful Egyptians

Published Wednesday 28 February 2007 at 12:35 by John Thaxter

A publishing phenomenon, Terry Deary’s Horrible Histories portray past events with the nasty bits left in. His foul facts about mad monarchs and gruesome grave-robbers have made him world’s best-selling non-fiction author for children. But the crafty cartoons by Aussie artist Martin Brown have also had much to do with their success. Indeed, Brown’s superb contributions to the souvenir programme and the 3D Bogglevision screen images are the most informative and engrossing parts of this live action version of The Awful Egyptians.

It would be wrong to criticise John-Paul Cherrington’s staging and Jacqueline Trousdale’s design for the disaster that stopped the show five-minutes after curtain-up, when a substantial part of the setting fell across the stage - luckily without harm to actors or audience. But after that early mood-breaker, the cast had difficulty recapturing audience attention, despite Alison Fitzjohn’s best efforts to chuckle us into submission, plus a ghoulish rap number to accompany a mummification ceremony.

As the central figure in the ancient Egyptian story, Mehdi Rezvan plays Ramesses the Second with quiet dignity, while Ciaran McConville and Abi Rahman dash around being pyramid builders, Egyptian underlings, intrepid explorers and pantomime cheerleaders. 

But the unique features of the show, following the interval, are the three-dimensional computer game-style screen effects, designed by Amazing Interactives. Seen through polarised specs, these have showers of spectral scenery flying off the back wall into our laps. Best of all is the sensation of actually moving within and around a tomb in the Valley of the Kings, then joining Ozymandias on his entry to eternal life. Magic!