The Stage

Steve Nallon’s Adventures in Wonderland

Published Friday 27 August 2004 at 12:55 by Nick Awde

Armed only with his voice, charm and an enviable feel for his story, impressionist Steve Nallon launches into one of the most magical re-tellings you will see of Lewis Carroll’s surreal classic.

A human carousel of characters, Nallon plucks them at will to bring Alice and her loopy co-stars to life. Robin Williams becomes the White Rabbit, Kenneth Williams the Dodo, Ann Widdecombe the Duchess, David Beckham the Dormouse and, in a masterstroke of casting, Homer Simpson pontificates as the Caterpillar and Johnny Vegas morphs into Humpty Dumpty. Even Julie Andrews, Basil and Sybil Fawlty and Ozzy Osbourne get a look in for reasons I can’t quite fathom but continue to chuckle over.

And it is not all burlesque, there is some subtle stuff going on here if you concentrate. When Alice starts to shrink, Nallon has her descend the social scale - thereby going from posh Penelope Keith via a middle-class Maggie Smith to a very lower working-class Caroline Aherne of The Royle Family. Curiouser and curiouser - and clever too, when, as she gets larger again, Alice goes through a Patricia Routledge-as-Mrs Bucket phase. All quite logical really.

Magically paced and vividly presented, Nallon’s impressions find unexpected humour in material that is already eternally comic.