Mr Stink, The Mayflower (From Daily Echo)

Mr Stink, The Mayflower

in Stage Reviews

WITH a name like Mr Stink, it’s questionable whether this production could ever come up smelling of roses, but this musical adaptation of David Walliam’s best-selling children’s book is certainly no stinker.

There’s a good idea of what’s in store when you enter the theatre and pick up your Little Book of Stinks, an innovative booklet you are encouraged to scratch and sniff throughout the evening.

From smelly feet to burps, farts and pond weed, the audience is spared nothing as it enters the smelly world of Mr Stink, “the stinkiest stinker who ever lived”.

The small but perfectly formed cast breathes fragrant life into the story of the tramp who is befriended by lonely, bullied schoolgirl Chloe Crumb, the object of too much unwanted attention at school and not enough of the right sort at home.

Invited home to live in the Crumbs’ garden shed, Mr Stink initially gets right up Chloe’s mother’s nose, until she works out that having a homeless man – and a smelly one at that – in her house is just what she needs to further her own political ambitions.

But there’s always a moral to every story, and it is of course the sweetness on the inside that finally triumphs over the rotten eggs on the outside.

There are moments when the action slows and the children’s attention wanders, but another belch gag or highenergy song and dance routine is never far away, and the enjoyable scratch and sniff moments are nicely paced throughout the show.

Peter Edbrook ‘s twinkly portrayal of Mr Stink manages to make even this smelliest of down-and-outs believably loveable, and he is wonderfully paired with Lotte Gilmore as the feisty girl with a heart of gold.

Mark Peachey was a favourite with my girls, who loved him when he was the down-trodden Mr Crumb, and even more when he was working the puppet dog Duchess, Mr Stink’s loveable hound.

Steve Blacker was a delight in all his roles, particularly the oily prime minister.

But for me it’s Julia J Nagle who steals the show, with her sparkling portrayal of Chloe’s monstrous mother and wannabe MP, Janet Crumb (“it’s pronounced Croooomb!”). She hams it up wonderfully, with more than a passing nod to that other arch social snob, Hyacinth Bucket.

With singing, dancing, puppetry, and a host of fart and belch gags, Mr Stink is aimed squarely at a six to ten-yearold audience, but there’s plenty there for adults, too.

He might be the stinkiest stinker who ever lived, but Mr Stink is also a rare breath of fresh air.