Bing Live Coming to Lichfield Garrick

If you are looking for a first theatre experience for pre school children then it is definitely worth considering a trip to the lovely Bing Live Show. It is finally arriving at the Lichfield Garrick on the 6 October – 7 October.

My children have fond memories of watching Bing on Cbeebies. The lovable show is based on the books by based on the books by Ted Dewan and follows adorable bunny Bing as he learns about the world around him. We were invited to watch the show at the Town Hall Birmingham before its run at the Lichfield Garrick. As the girls are now a little too old for this show we decided to treat my two-year-old neice who was really excited to watch the show. We were sent a lovely pack of treats to get in the mood for watching the show.

There is nothing more lovely than a whole theatre of excited preschool children cheering for their favourite character. All the characters in the show are there: Bing, Sula, Coco and Pando as well as Flop and Amma. When each of the Bing characters come on stage they get so excited to see them. The puppets are wonderful, they are perfect recreations of the cartoon and they are so detailed, they even blink. You can see the puppeteers but they soon become part of the action. The children love to join in with the catch phrase “It’s a Bing thing!”

Of course with an audience of this age there will be noise during the performance. This is not a show where you have to sit in silence, so you feel comfotable to talk and sing along and answer the million questions they ask in the first five minutes. The show is loud, so if you have a little one who is particularly sensitive to noise they might not be ready for this show.

Bing Live is suitable for children of any age. If they are over six months old then they need a ticket. At Lichfield these start from £18. The show is 75 minutes long, including a 15 minute interval. Although this seems like a long time for little attention spans, it is broken into lots of shorter sections with a fun mix of song and dance and story telling which keeps them engaged. There is also lots of audience particpation and it was delightful to see even the shyest child up and dancing and joining in by the end of the first half. The dances are simple and fun to copy, and there is so much humour, the children are laughing out loud at the silly costumes the characters wear. Everyone left with a smile on their face and found it a positive first experience to create a lifelong love of the theatre.