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n 2009, the Royal Shakespeare Company announced its intention to stage a musical adaptation of Roald Dahl’s children’s novel Matilda. It’s not all endless reboots of Henry IV Part II over in Stratford; the company is no stranger to musicals, with Les Mis being one of their biggest hits. What’s more, Dahl’s books had proven previous when it came to musical adaptations; quite apart from penning Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Fantastic Mr Fox and James and the Giant Peach, Dahl had adapted Ian Fleming’s Chitty Chitty Bang Bang for the screen. And Matilda effortlessly ticked all the important Dahl boxes – a clever, bookish child overcomes the neglect of dimwit adults and the cruelty of a bullying teacher; it’s funny and subversive, with a spirited heroine that appealed to girls and boys alike. The RSC hired Dennis Kelly to write the book and Tim Minchin the tunes; the director would be Matthew Warchus. An engaging cast was added to the mix, and after a successful
12-week trial at Stratford, the show – now called Matilda the Musical – stormed first the West End and then Broadway. Since then, it’s won 90 international awards, including seven Oliviers – the most ever won by a musical, until spoilsport Hamilton came along and evened the playing field. Critics fell over themselves to outfulsome one another. Matilda was dubbed ‘inexpressibly moving,’ ‘anarchically joyous,’ and ‘sublimely good fun’. On Broadway, the influential New York Times critic Ben Brantley called it ‘the most satisfying musical ever to have come out of Britain’. And it wasn’t just a creative success; the RSC’s adaptation has become an essential cash cow, at a time when all theatres are at risk from ongoing Arts Council cuts. So much for hindsight – but naturally writer Dennis knew none of the above when it began. “I mainly remember it being a laugh,” he says. “We did a series of two-week workshops in the RSC’s rehearsal rooms, and we had so much fun. It wasn’t easy, by any means; I’d written a play with holes in, and it wasn’t until
Tim Minchin came in that it started growing into a full show. But it was a lovely time, and a great learning curve to go on.” The hardest thing, says Dennis, was working out the structure. “Dahl is a master of his craft, but his craft is books. And a book is very different to a play or musical. For example, in the book, Matilda is quite passive at the beginning and doesn’t meet Miss Trunchbull so early, so we had to pull that story forward. There were also lots of decisions to make about how to tell the story – whether to have a narrator, and things like that.” The reaction at the first preview night was the envy of theatre producers up and down the country.“I remember that after the song Naughty the crowd went wild,” says Dennis. “At the end they were on their feet, which isn’t something I’m used to, as most of my plays are really dark. It was a great moment, and the first time we realised we were really on to something. But we never took it for granted that it would be a success.” Dahl’s no stranger to darkness, of course, and has never been shy of dispatching unlovely
“One of the reasons children like Roald Dahl is because he doesn’t lie. Kids are constantly lied to” www.mediaclash.co.uk I BRISTOL LIFE I 33