Jon, Producer
Christmas again? Already?! How time flies! Well, as soon as the stage was swept after the Alice in Wonderland panto last year and with the sound of applause still ringing in our ears, we started planning the 2016 production of … CBeebies’ The Nutcracker!
So, Jon, why was the CBeebies' The Nutcracker chosen?
Nearly everyone has heard of The Nutcracker – and hopefully you’ve started humming the tune of the Sugar Plum Fairy right now – but when asked what the story is, people’s memories tend to go a little fuzzy! It’s most well-known as a ballet of course, but we’re staging a contemporary production – a modern take on this story set on Christmas Eve.
It will have music and dance at its heart, as we tell the story of a brother and sister who are magically transported by their adventurous Uncle to a Land of Sweets – learning how precious it is to work together and be with loved ones at Christmas time.
What CBeebies Treatment can we expect to see on it?
I can promise it will be full to the brim of Christmas cheer and heartily encourage you to settle down to watch it, adorned in your Christmas jumpers, and with your favourite toys alongside you – for this is a magical tale of toys coming to life!
This year we’ve got many CBeebies stars in the cast of course, but we’re also going to be welcoming some people you won’t recognise from the channel.
We have got two professional dancers ing us, a special storytelling band, and some younger of the Sheffield People’s Theatre. It’s going to be a busy stage (!) but that just makes for a visual feast giving you lots to spot as you watch it over and over again!
Which theatre is it at this year?
We’re staging the production at The Crucible theatre in Sheffield. The avid fans among you might that we staged A Christmas Carol panto there 3 years ago. It’s such a fantastic theatre where the audience surround the stage, and we love how intimate the performances there are, so we felt it high time to return and lay on another spectacular there.
How can we get tickets to the CBeebies Panto 2016?
As in previous years we’re running a ticket ballot for the CBeebies Christmas Show so you all have a chance of ing us in Sheffield to see the production being filmed between the 4-5th November … keep your eye on our CBeebies Grown-ups Facebook and Twitter for updates on the ballot.
Last year we had a staggering amount of interest for our Christmas Show – where nearly 200,000 ticket applications for the CBeebies Panto were received: putting it second only to Strictly Come Dancing on the BBC ticket request charts! I think we can top a quarter of a million applications this year which would be incredible! It just goes to show how families have this production as part of their own Christmas tradition and how well loved it is. I’m choosing to see that as a great privilege to produce the production, and not dwell too much on the enormity of the responsibility!
As always, there are a few surprises that we don’t want to give away! But I’ll tease you by saying I’m really excited by the professional dancers we have ing us. They’re going to both provide an unexpected twist to our treatment of the story – and I’m sure that they’ll give a performance that your little ones will enjoy watching time and again!
I can’t wait to get to Sheffield and the cast and team – there’s a fantastic company of theatre folk behind the show and when we get together we’re all one big family! It’s an awesome achievement to rehearse, stage and film a 45min musical in just the 6 days we have together – but it’s all down to some seriously talented people, planning everything to the last detail, and putting in a huge amount of work.
But to see the reactions on children’s faces, to hear the applause and to receive comments from families who officially “start” Christmas when they watch the production on TV – that makes it all worth it!
Thanks Jon – good luck!
For grown-up chatter, behind the scenes fun and TV times updates, follow CBeebies Grown-ups on Facebook and Twitter. The ballot for this year's CBeebies Christmas Show tickets is now closed, but you can sign up to BBC Shows and Tours Mailing list and receive notifications about CBeebies events. You may want to check your spam/promotions email folder to make sure an email doesn’t end up in there!
