New musical creators invite audiences to help them make the show in isolation

Rebecca Atkinson-Lord and Rebecca Applin will present their new musical Cautionary Tale in a whole new way this summer.

Development on the show was interrupted by the lockdowns, meaning workshop performances were forced to be cancelled. Atkinson-Lord and Applin have now created a new workaround to continue the show's growth.

For five weeks, they will release sheet music and backing tracks, TikTok choreography, character sketches and script extracts. In the sixth week, the best of these recordings will be used to create a Zoom production of the show.

Atkinson-Lord (former director of theatre at Ovalhouse) and Applin (Cameron Mackintosh Resident Composer Award recipient) are collaborating with choreographer Mark Iles (The Brook Under Siege) and designer James Turner.

Inspired by the likes of Road Dahl, Tim Burton and Hilaire Belloc, the show is set in the town of Gloaming, where every inhabitant has special powers.

Atkinson-Lord comments: "I wrote Cautionary Tale at a time when I was really unhappy because I felt trapped in a life that didn't feel authentic. It's a show about finding joy in the darkest of circumstances and right now it feels like we all need a bit of help to be happy, so it seemed like the right thing to do to share it with people.

"The Covid-19 pandemic has meant that we can't finish making and staging the show as we'd planned and to see years of work come to nothing has been incredibly sad for the whole team. I hope that people will help us make it happen anyway by staging bits of it in their own homes and sharing them online – and maybe we can all remember how to find a bit more joy."

You can find out more here.