Grimhilda!

The musical, Grimhilda!, has been a prime subject of this blog for some months now.   Here's a brief synopsis of the story.

The hero is a little boy called Toby, whose parents are always too busy to spend time with him, and leave him to be looked after by babysitters.  

A new babysitter arrives just as the story begins, and there seems to be something different about her.  Toby enjoyed his previous babysitters because they were prepared to do things like telling him stories before he went to sleep, but this newest babysitter makes him nervous.  As usual, his parents are too busy getting ready to go out to notice anything strange about her.

And Toby's qualms prove to be on the button: the babysitter rushes him off to bed, and even seems to have control over what she looks like.

Toby goes to sleep but is woken in the night by some of his toys who tell him the babysitter is far worse than he thought: a Grimhilda Red Alert has been posted. Because of her something nasty has happened to his parents.  Toby must get up in the night and go and rescue them, or else he'll never see them again.   With some reluctance he sets off to the Grimhilderness Mountains, with a rag doll for support, and a large, live Map to guide him.

After some serious setbacks he finds himself confronting not only Grimhilda, but a life and death situation affecting not only his parents but Toby himself.

Grimhilda! has a cast of over twenty singers and actors.  The script has been written by two Dunedinites, Mike Crowl and Cherianne Parks, with the music composed by Mike Crowl.   The production company is Stageworks, which presented a very successful season of The Mousetrap, by Agatha Christie, last year.


The director is Bert Nisbet, and the musical director is Jonathan Drummond.


Helen Wilson will play Grimhilda.  The part of Toby is being shared on alternate nights by Max Beal and Kelland O'Neil.   Polly, the rag doll, will be shared by Emily Kerr-Bell and Emily Hill.


Toby's parents will be played by Kathryn Gardner and Tim McGuire.


The production opens on the 27th April at the Mayfair Theatre.  There will be three performances from the 27th -29th April, and then another four from the 3rd - 6th May.  All evening performances will start at 7 pm, and the two Sunday matinees will be at 2 pm.