Have we finally reached Peak Paddington? The Young Peruvian bear’s spectacular film-begat renaissance hasn’t just yielded a trilogy of hit film: there’s a tie-in TV series for younger kids, there was that skit he did with the late Queen, and 2024 saw the opening of official immesive attraction the Paddington Bear Experience. A really banging computer game aside, it’s hard to see what else there is to do with the character beyond ‘more films’. Apart from, of course, a big splashy West End musical. Which we’re now getting: West End super-producer Sonia Friedman has done the honours, assembling a crack team headed by playwright Jessica Swale doing the book and kids’ author and McFly member Tom Fletcher on songs, all directed by Luke Shepherd, who did such a good job with the smash revival of Starlight Express.
Beyond that we don’t know a huge amount, other than the plot will roughly trace Paddington’s classic origin story of turning up at the titular station and being taken in by the kind-hearted Brown family.
As with all noveaux Paddington stuff, the musical is co-produced by the film company STUDIOCANAL, who have hitherto been quite painstaking about tying everything back to their films – the Paddington Bear Experience was based around an exact replica of the Browns’ house from the movies, and the redoubtable Ben Whishaw has provided the voice for films, TV show and Experience. A musical would however seem like an understandable and probably advisable opportunity to do something a bit different.
All will be revealed this autumn, with casting announcements when they come presumably giving a few clues as to what we can expect – most notably the question of what the deal is with Paddington himself. Will he be some bloke in a beat suit? A puppet voiced by a pre-recorded Whishaw? A puppet with a live voice actor who probably won’t be Ben Whishaw? All will hopefully become clearer in relatively short order.
It’s aimed at ages six plus.
