Age guidance: 4+
Contains haze, flashing lights, a disco ball and loud music.
Plot summary
We want to ensure that audience members can make an informed decision about whether our work is suitable for themselves. The summary below includes spoilers but may be useful to those who prefer to know what happens in the show.
In a short prologue, newsreader Rupert Scaremonger announces that Baroness Scrimp, minister for the north, has defeated an invisible giant that has terrorised Hull, but to beware any future threats.
The show then starts with dame Pattie Breadcake welcoming the audience to her Buns of Steel bakery, where she and her granddaughter, Red Riding Hood, sing a medley about baking cakes for the people of Hull.
Pattie reads from a pop-up book that warns of a werewolf that will cause havoc in Hull at midnight when there is a full moon, which happens to fall that night. Pattie is terrified and plans to stay in the bakery, which happens to be the only independent shop left, since Baroness Scrimp took over all of the others. Their delivery driver also has the same idea of staying indoors, so Red Riding Hood agrees to venture into the dark to deliver their baked goods instead.
After Red leaves, Pattie Breadcake finds herself a man in the audience and then marries him on the spot.
Baroness Scrimp then arrives and Pattie Breadcake encourages the audience to boo her. Baroness Scrimp has visited to try to convince Pattie to sell the bakery. Pattie mentions the legend of the werewolf, which Scrimp latches onto as a way to convince Pattie to sell the bakery. She refuses and Scrimp exits, urging people to trust nobody.
Rupert Scaremonger returns to his TV screen, urging people to stay indoors because of the werewolf.
In the woods, lumberjack Jack Lumber is dreaming of a job that creates, rather than destroys, when Red Riding Hood arrives on her scooter. Red shares a pie and Jack shares some of his poetry, before fleeing just before midnight. He then returns to confess to the audience that he is an actual werewolf – but a friendly one.
In the next scene Baroness Scrimp appears on Rupert Scaremonger’s show to introduce Colonel Blowhard, a hunter she has hired to track down the werewolf. When the camera stops rolling, Scrimp reveals her plan to Blowhard for him to dress as the werewolf to scare Pattie Breadcake out of the bakery.
Back in the woods, Jack Lumber transforms into the werewolf, while Rupert shares clearly fake footage of a werewolf rampaging around Hull.
Interval.
The second act starts with Pattie Breadacke hiding in the pantry. She encourages the children in the audience to sing a song to distract her from ghosts, which keep making an appearance and the audience can scream at.
In the wood, Red Riding Hood meets Jack Lumber as the werewolf, but realises he is nothing to fear. In the meantime, Rupert Scaremonger is reporting that the werewolf – which is actually Scrimp and Blowhard in costume – is headed towards the Buns of Steel bakery.
They arrive at the bakery and threaten to eat Pattie Breadcake if she doesn’t hand over the bakery. They enter and Blowhard bundles Pattie into the pantry again, while Scrimp disguises herself as Pattie Breadcake, just before Red Riding Hood arrives, then Rupert Scaremonger with his TV camera.
Scrimp, disguised as Granny, tries to convince Red Riding Hood to sign away the bakery, but the audience tell Red Riding Hood it’s not really Pattie Breadcake. Suddenly, Jack Lumber as the werewolf arrives, frightening Blowhard into submission. Scrimp reveals his true identity however and threatens him with arrest, but Red tells everybody about how Jack is nobody to fear.
Pattie Breadcake appeals to Rupert Scaremonger to tell the truth for once, on air, and he agrees, as Baroness Scrimp’s plan unravels before her eyes.
The show finishes with a party tune to lift everybody’s spirits and Baroness Scrimp apologies for being evil, vowing to make amends, with Jack Lumber taking over as Minister for the North.
Last updated: 28 November, before rehearsals begin
If you have any questions about this production, please don’t hesitate to contact our audience development manager, Jamie Potter.
