The Hat is Back

"Children like to see things happening. They like to see some spectacle. And in this production it’s like they’re watching the pages of a storybook turn over, watching this world unfold in front of them." I’m speaking to Lillie Collier, who together with frequent collaborator Paul Taylor-Mills, is bringing Dr Seuss' beloved tale of domestic anarchy The Cat in the Hat to the Pleasance Courtyard.

So what it is that makes the story, with its plain line illustrations and tiny palette of blues, reds and whites, so enduringly beloved? "It’s really clean and precise," she answers. "So much kids’ literature now is so complex and detailed, and I think children really respond to the simplicity of it all – the iconic red and white hat, the naughty, trickster cat. There’s something open and approachable and identifiable in it, something for everyone to associate with."

Not that there’s anything simple about Taylor-Mills and Collier’s production, which remounts the blockbusting adaptation Katie Mitchell created for the National Theatre in 2009. That show was a blur of slapstick chaos, with absurd balancing acts, elastic performers and a real sense of Mitchell’s considerable genius, refined down to a diamond-hard forty minutes of fun. Collier is well aware of the challenge of taking on the Hat.

"They give you ‘the Bible’ when you get the rights. It’s like a huge cheat-sheet explaining how to build [original designer] Vicky Mortimer’s set, which is very much like the illustrations from the book sprung on to the stage, and how to source and build props and costumes. Our designer, David Shields, has been able to use it to create pretty much everything that the National production had. We’ve added our own twists, but there’s been no expense spared in bringing it to life."

Mitchell’s adaptation sprints along to the rhythm of Paul Clarke’s original score, and that means that Collier needs to direct the onstage chaos, as the titular cat rips through a house one dozy, rainy afternoon, with incredible timing and precision. 

"Every ball or plate that drops has to fall just right, every tip of the hat has to be perfectly timed, so our actors are as active offstage as they are on. It’s like a production of Noises Off - it’s great fun to watch them all rushing around."

But it’s not at all an exercise in slavish replication, as the company have taken the unique nature of the Fringe to heart and added several new moments of audience participation, almost de rigueur for any kids’ show worth its salt. 

It all flashes by in a little over half an hour – a perfect slice of relentless fun and carnage for the whole family.

They’ve even recreated the demented many-armed machine that the cat uses to clear the house at the end of his whimsical, crockery-shattering rave. "We’re going to use it to clear away all the other flyers on the Royal Mile," Collier laughs, "and give out ours!"